The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced a final wage index change for the Medicare Hospice Benefits Plan in an immediate release today, Friday, July 16, 2010. The information comes from the Department of Health and Human Services and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in Washington, DC's Office of Media Affairs.

Hospice centers that serve Medicaid patients will see a big change in their policies in 2011.

Hospice facilities who serve Medicaid patients will see an estimated 1.8 percent increase in their payments in 2011, according to the notice released today by the CMS. The news that was released today was pending for a long time in regards to the ongoing efforts of CMS to support patients' access to hospice services.  

There used to be, by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), now CMS, a very outdated method to determine hospice payments by Medicaid. Now, this has changed and there is a more updated, current and accurate method for determining hospice payments. This new payment system is supposed to minimize any disturbances to Medicaid services when the adjustment was applied.

The new notice asks for comments on the new rulings and all feedback will be taken into consideration. The new approach is meant to modernize the hospice aggregate cap calculations of payments. "These approaches take advantage of new computing technologies to streamline the cap calculations, which may lead to a timelier provider notification of overpayments." And CMS welcomes and promises to consider any and all comments in their future analyses and possible future rulemaking.

The new Medicare notice from the CMS also discusses the “Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Update” for Calendar Year 2011 and also welcomes the public consumer to give any and all feedback and comments they may have pertaining to this ruling as well.

This new Home Health Prospective Payment System Rate Update rule has been proposed and is expected to be published this summer. "The home health care proposed rule will include a hospice proposal for implementing a new requirement for a face-to-face encounter by a physician or nurse practitioner prior to recertifying the eligibility of a Medicare beneficiary for hospice services, as mandated by the Affordable Care Act." 

Written by KC Kelly, Ph.D.