The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) confirmed the extension by more than two years of repayment terms for advance Medicare cash floated to providers, while also offering further relief of up to five years for operators in particular financial distress. Under the more generous terms, passed earlier this month as part of a […]
Category: Medicare
The federal authorities that regulate skilled nursing facilities issued a slew of changes to the rules governing nursing home care in the early months of spring as part of efforts to curb the spread of COVID-19 in the facilities. Some of those changes, such as the loosening of restrictions around the use of telemedicine, are […]
While the skilled nursing landscape continues to struggle both operationally and financially during the COVID-19 pandemic, those same negative forces have only served to strengthen private health plans — putting Medicare Advantage in an even better position to continue its growth. Cratering census and sharp declines in elective surgeries, while fiscally devastating for nursing homes, […]
The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the need for high-level clinicians in nursing facilities, but a pending change to Medicare reimbursements could force physicians to take a steep pay cut in order to continue to practicing in post-acute and long-term care — or push them further and further out of the space. The Medicare Physician Fee […]
After scoring significant successes in reducing hospital readmissions among its own nursing homes with telehealth, a major hospital network is looking to market its virtual interventions to a wider swath of post-acute and long-term care facilities. Northwell Health, the largest health care provider in New York State, saw rehospitalizations decline by up to half at […]
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on Friday announced the finalization of a new kidney-care payment rule, but the regulation specifically exempts patients who are receiving their dialysis treatment in the nursing home. The End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) Treatment Choices (ETC) Model is intended to test whether greater use of home dialysis and […]
A leading wound care provider sees expansion opportunity in both skilled nursing and the home despite the ongoing strains of COVID-19, with a recent private equity investment to back it up. American Medical Technologies in late August announced its acquisition by private equity firm One Equity Partners and investment management company The Silverfern Group, capping […]
As COVID-19 continues to bring sickness and death to American nursing homes, Harvard University professor David Grabowski has become one of the most-quoted experts on the steps that operators and the government should take to stem the tide. But as the summer turns to fall during a pandemic that started in late winter, the long-term […]
Billions of federal stimulus dollars have kept the skilled nursing sector afloat during the COVID-19 pandemic, but as the most recent distributions hit operators’ bank accounts, storm clouds are still gathering in the distance. While nursing home operators may have been spared the immediate financial woes that hit businesses in a variety of other sectors, […]
The rising tide of managed care enrollment for both Medicare and Medicaid patients continues to swell, and as the nation grapples with the costs of the pandemic, SNFs should be aware of the moves states might make to implement some type of managed care model as they try to secure budgetary stability. The steady increase […]
The leader of the largest trade group for U.S. nursing homes on Thursday advised operators to exceed new federal COVID-19 testing mandates whenever possible, while emphasizing the importance of planning for complying with the new regulations as soon as next week. “I would be testing, once a week, all staff. I would be doing that […]
A few weeks after the nation’s top Medicare official pointed to persistent infection control problems as a major driver of rising COVID-19 cases in nursing homes, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on Tuesday introduced new online training resources for frontline staffers and management. Officials based the new “CMS Targeted COVID-19 Training for […]
The new Medicare payment model for post-acute care providers has largely gotten lost in the more pressing concerns of COVID-19, but as operators continue to struggle with increased costs related to the pandemic, some are still making mistakes that could cause them to lose out on money they earned. The differences between the top performers […]
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced on Monday that routine inspections for all Medicare- and Medicaid-certified providers and suppliers will resume, after suspending them as part of its response to the COVID-19 pandemic in March. The agency directed the resumption of onsite revisit surveys, non-immediate jeopardy complaint surveys and annual recertification surveys […]
The federal government on Friday announced that it has handed out $15 million in civil monetary penalties (CMPs) to about 3,400 nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic. That total includes about $10 million in fines stemming from targeted infection control surveys, and $5.5 million assessed to operators that failed to report COVID-19 data as required […]
The federal government’s latest targeted coronavirus aid for nursing homes will consist of four separate programs, with a significant portion of the $5 billion price tag doled out based on operators’ performance in monthly value-based competitions. Of that pledged total, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will distribute half — or $2.5 billion […]
Occupancy at Sabra Health Care REIT’s (Nasdaq: SBRA) skilled nursing facilities tumbled 811 basis points since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, but executives remained upbeat about the shift toward Medicare-funded services — even if the rafts of federal relief cash muddy the overall valuation picture. That census decline sits slightly higher than other industry […]
The federal government is proposing a range of reductions to Medicare reimbursement for various Part B therapy services as part of its Medicare Physician Fee Schedule for the calendar year 2021, including physical, occupational and speech-language services in skilled nursing facilities. The fee schedule was announced by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) […]
The federal government has opened its coffers of COVID-19 relief funds to the operators of facilities that changed hands in the months leading up to the coronavirus pandemic, but the window to strike is small. In the name of expediency, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) rushed out relief dollars to health care […]
The federal government on Friday finalized a previously proposed rule that will bring a 2.2% Medicare payment bump to the nation’s skilled nursing facilities. Under the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) 2021 payment rule, facilities will see a total increase of $750 million in Medicare reimbursements over the next fiscal year, which begins […]