On March 15,
the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) released its annual Report to
the Congress.
In the
report, MedPAC addresses the
home
health PPS in Chapter 8. MedPAC states that most indicators of payment
adequacy for home health are positive.
According to
MedPAC, because these indicators are so similar to last year’s research, the
Commission is repeating its recommendations from the March 2011 Report to the
Congress.
The official
recommendations to Congress in regards to home health are as follows:
-
The
Secretary, with the Office of Inspector General, should conduct medical
review activities in counties that have aberrant home health utilization.
The Secretary should implement the new authorities to suspend payment and
the enrollment of new providers if they indicate significant fraud.
-
The
Congress should direct the Secretary to begin a two-year rebasing of home
health rates in 2013 and eliminate the market basket update for 2013. This
changed slightly and changed the year of market basket elimination to 2013
as opposed to 2012.
- The
Secretary should revise the home health case-mix system to rely on patient
characteristics to set payment for therapy and nontherapy services and
should no longer use the number of therapy visits as a payment factor.
- The
Congress should direct the Secretary to establish a per episode copay for
home health episodes that are not preceded by hospitalization or
post-acute care use.
© 2012 Beacon Health, a division of HCPro, Inc. All rights reserved.
