OASIS Alert

Question: In answering M0800 (Man-agement of injectable medications), does it matter whether the patient is receiving the injectable medication at home or must the injection just be on the medication orders?

Answer: Until the Centers for Med-icare & Medicaid Services released the April 2008 OASIS questions and answers, this question was unclear to clinicians. Previous Q&As (M0800 Questions 24 and 25) had clarified parts of the question, but not whether the medication must be administered at home.

The final word: Now in the April 2008 OASIS Q&A number 12, CMS in-structs: "When a patient is receiving an injectable medication in the physician's office or other setting outside the home, it is not included in the assessment of M0800."

Clarification: M0800 reports the pa-tient's ability to prepare and take (inject) all prescribed injectable medications that the patient is receiving in the home while under the home health plan of care. M0800 requires an assessment of the patient's cognitive and physical ability to draw up the correct dose accurately using aseptic technique, inject in an appropriate site using correct technique, and dispose of the syringe properly, CMS advises.

Requirements: M0800 includes one-time injections ordered to be given in the home, as long as the injection is to occur during the time covered by the plan of care. If the injection is not on the day of the assessment, the clinician must assess the patient and infer whether the patient can give the injection properly, CMS says.

If the nurse or another person administers the injection, the clinician must determine whether that is for convenience or be-cause the patient is unable to administer it.