Once its 100% acquisition of Kindred at Home is finalized, Humana Inc. (NYSE: HUM) believes it will become one of the premier home health care providers in the entire country. It certainly has the resources to be just that. That’s partly because the payer-provider hybrid is also directly contracting with traditional Medicare through the Global […]
Category: CMS
The U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has extended the Comprehensive Care for Joint Replacement (CJR) payment model. That’s welcome news for home health operators, as CJR has been a key program for participating agencies since its implementation. Introduced in 2016, CJR essentially allows CMS to hand out bonuses or inflict payment penalties […]
A delay in the Global and Professional Direct Contracting Model by the Biden administration has put the already-accepted direct-contracting entities (DCEs) in a coveted position. New entrants are no longer being accepted for participation in the model while the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and its innovation arm review the details. That gives […]
Changes to the requirements for Medicare provider enrollment could have major consequences for home health providers down the line. Under provider enrollment requirements, the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has the authority to rescind providers’ Medicare enrollment if they are associated with “bad actors” and are at risk for fraud due to […]
It has been over three months since former Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator Seema Verma resigned from her post. As of Wednesday, no one has officially filled the position’s void. The Biden administration’s pick for administrator, Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, has yet to be confirmed by the Senate due to ongoing partisan disputes. For […]
The Global and Professional Direct Contracting Model — a Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) creation — has been put on pause. The holdup is just another example of CMMI pumping the brakes on an alternative payment model in the days since the Biden administration took over the executive branch. Broadly, the Global and […]
The U.S. health care system has hit a defining moment in its shift toward value-based care, with the major decision in 2021 being an aggressive acceleration or cautious slowdown of the nation’s portfolio of alternative payment models. Liz Fowler, the new head of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI), has been thinking about […]
It has been six months since the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) gave home health agencies and other Medicare providers a reprieve from having to pay back advance and accelerated payment loans. But recoupment for these loans is just around the corner. To avoid future financial headaches, providers must be prepared to […]
After making gradual inroads over the past few years, the hospital-at-home model has seemingly had its breakthrough moment. That came in November, when the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) introduced its “Acute Hospital Care At Home” wavier program. The creation of CMS’s wavier — a COVID-19 relief measure — has created a […]
Home health providers are one step closer to getting a continued suspension of Medicare sequestration payment reductions. The U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 1868 by a 246-175 vote on Friday. The bill, originally introduced earlier this month by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), pauses automatic spending cuts to Medicare and other programs for […]