Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement
AHCA Doles Out SNF Financing Tips
The American Health Care Association is generally pleased with Medicare's reimbursement plan for skilled nursing facilities, but it has a few suggestions on ways to make the system stronger.
Noting that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services plans to implement its payment rule with a $16 payment cliff between the first and second quarter of fiscal year 2006, AHCA is calling for the agency to average out the payment differential. It's also urging CMS against implementing a bad debt rule in FY 2006.
In addition, AHCA is calling on regulators to preserve grace-day periods and the "look back" to the complexity of the preceding hospital stay, phase in changes to the wage index geographic classifications, ease three-day hospital stay requirements, update consolidated billing rules and develop a post-acute patient assessment instrument that providers would use uniformly.
"While we appreciate the attention that CMS has given to our concerns and the agency's willingness to work with us to craft a package of refinements that addresses economic stability issues, we believe that CMS' proposals could be further refined to better achieve the administration's commitments for 2006," says AHCA President and CEO Hal Daub.
Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement
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AHCA Doles Out SNF Financing Tips
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