Home Health & Hospice Week

New HAVEN software due in mid-September

Beginning Oct. 1, home health agencies must make the switch to OASIS Version 1.40. But they have a choice about whether to adopt a reduced OASIS dataset if they haven't done so already. "Home health agencies may use either the reduced burden OASIS-B1 (12/2002) or may continue to use the previous version ... as long as the data submission requirements are met including changes to M0016, M0230, M0240, and the addition of M0245," the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services explains in a question-and-answer document based on its Aug. 20 teleconference with OASIS software vendors. M0016 requires branch ID numbers. "Agencies should go with the fully reduced OASIS version," advises consultant Pam Warmack with Clinic Connections in Ruston, LA. "It is the first 'break' nursing has had in the paperwork burden imposed by the [OASIS] assessment requirement since its inception." Using a reduced OASIS assessment is also good for staff morale, Warmack says. "All the nurses in the agencies I deal with were very, very receptive to changing to the reduced OASIS version." "The cost of change in time and materials may ... be a key factor in OASIS conversion," says consultant Linda Rutman with the Charlotte, NC-based LarsonAllen Health Care Group. Rutman recommends using a "positives/negatives decision tree" to assist in the decision-making process. CMS offered a reduced dataset as early as last December, but many HHAs decided to put off using the slimmed-down assessments until they had to change them for V codes anyway (see pdf of Eli's HCW, Vol. XII, No. 4, p. 27). The reduced dataset drops 45 Moo items from followup assessments and establishes a patient data tracking sheet. "Items not required will not be stored on the state database," CMS says in the Q&A. Agencies that do decide to change their OASIS forms should go ahead and cast a critical eye over their entire comprehensive assessment "to determine if there are any other changes or consolidations which could be implemented at the same time," Rutman advises. Meanwhile, vendor testing looks like it will be tight. CMS won't update the "vendor server" - which will allow testing of new and revised OASIS software - until Sept. 26, five days before the new OASIS version takes effect. But vendors can use the new HAVEN software that will be issued in mid-September to test files, CMS says.