Posted on Thursday, April 27, 2017 10:59 AM
In the fall of 2017, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will start beta testing on the standardized assessment items required by the Improving Medicare Post-Acute Transformation (IMPACT) Act for post-acute care (PAC) providers.
The PAC providers include the following:
• Skilled nursing facilities (SNF)
• Inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRF)
• Long term care hospitals (LTCH)
• Home health agencies (HHAs)
The standardized assessment data must include the following areas:
• Function
• Cognitive
• Special services. treatments and interventions
• Medical conditions and co-morbidities
• Impairments
The national testing sample will include a total of 210 PAC providers across the following geographic locations:
• Boston, MA,
• Chicago, IL,
• Dallas, TX,
• Durham, NC,
• Fort Lauderdale, FL,
• Harrisburg, PA
• Houston, TX
The following number of providers are anticipated for selection:
• 84 SNFs, 28 IRFs
• 28 LTCHs
• 70 HHAs
Providers will be selected randomly with estimates of about six SNFs, two IRFs, two LTCH and five HHAs will be chosen per location.
Invites to participate in the beta testing will be sent out via mailings from the CMS contractor in late April or early May 2017. The testing is expected to run from October 2017 – May 2018.
Alpha 1 field testing was completed by CMS in October 2016. CMS is currently conducting Alpha 2 testing, with a completion date of July 2017.
The standardized assessment items must be incorporated into the Outcome and Assessment Information Set, which will be reported by home health agencies no later than January 2019.
For more information on testing for the standardized assessment items, click here.
For the full article, click here.
About Corridor
Corridor is the nation’s preferred partner and trusted business advisor to home health and hospice providers, providing quality services and impactful results for 30 years. Focusing on key operational, regulatory and financial challenges, Corridor delivering industry-unique solutions and deep expertise in coding, clinical documentation review, compliance, billing and collections , consulting and provider staff education . At Corridor, we make the business of caring for people Better! For the most important industry updates and news that impacts home health and hospice, please make sure to sign up for our weekly newsletter to receive the latest up-to-date industry information direct to your inbox!
For additional information, please contact Corridor at 1-866-263-3795.
