by Tim Rowan | Dec 6, 2023 | CMS, Regulatory
by Tim Rowan, Editor Emeritus MA Plans Continue to Exaggerate Patient Conditions for Profit As we reported in October (More MA Plans Caught Inflating Patient Assessments, 10/11/23), insurance companies operating Medicare Advantage plans routinely pad the patient...
by Tim Rowan | Nov 15, 2023 | CMS, Editorial, Regulatory
Dear Friends, I have some news that may be upsetting. Frankly, that is my intention, to frighten you into action. In August, a Home Health provider in New York paid an $$866,339.25 fine for violating the “Civil Monetary Penalties Law.”* The Chinese-American...
by Tim Rowan | Nov 15, 2023 | Vendor Watch
by Tim Rowan, Editor Emeritus In September, we posted the announcement from HHAeXchange about their inking a deal to provide EMR and EVV software to Gentiva Personal Home Care. We had some questions about the partnership and both HHAeXchange president Stephen Vacarro...
by Tim Rowan | Oct 11, 2023 | Product Review
by Tim Rowan, Editor Walking a Thin Line Home Health owners are used to walking tightropes. Indeed, there are many they are forced to walk every year, if not more often. One tightrope is a daily one. It delineates the fine line between regulatory compliance and...
by Tim Rowan | Aug 23, 2023 | CMS, Regulatory
by Tim Rowan, Editor Home Care Agency Removed Black and Hispanic Home Health Aides from Assignments to Accommodate Racial Preferences of Clients, Federal Agency Charges There is a question that appears on social media chat pages with great regularity. What does a home...
by Tim Rowan | Aug 16, 2023 | Admin, Caring for the Caregiver, Clinical, Marketing, Recruitment & Retention
by Tim Rowan, Editor When Joseph Furtado, RN, COS-C, moved from one Phoenix-area Home Health agency to another earlier this year, he faced a seemingly insurmountable problem. The new place had dropped to a 600 census during the pandemic and got stuck there. Marketers...
by Tim Rowan | Aug 9, 2023 | Editorial
analysis by Tim Rowan, Editor It is good to occasionally remind ourselves that 2023 is the year enrollment in Medicare Advantage reached a full half of Medicare beneficiaries. Originally conceived as a plan to control spending, MA does seem to be achieving that goal....
by Tim Rowan | May 17, 2023 | Admin, Regulatory
by Tim Rowan, Editor T he Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division, has selected several southeastern states as targets for its investigation into a practice that appears to be quite common, underpaying in-home caregivers. It appears, based on early DoL reports,...
by Tim Rowan | Feb 1, 2023 | CMS, Medicare Advantage, Regulatory
by Tim Rowan, Editor CMS Rule to Protect Medicare The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, through the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, finalized the policies for the Medicare Advantage “Risk Adjustment Data Validation” program, which...
by Tim Rowan | Sep 16, 2020 | CMS, Editorial
Insurance Industry Insider Instructs Providers September 16, 2020 by Wendell Potter (Adapted with permission from an article posted on the author’s Twitter feed. –Editor) My former colleagues in the health insurance industry claim they are waiving all costs of...