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Latest Home Health News

CMS revises OASIS-C draft based on field tests

CMS released its newly refined OASIS-C draft Nov. 19 giving agencies a closer look at what will be required, starting as soon as 2010. The 21-page revised draft incorporates feedback from CMS’s field-testing, completed this fall. Changes include revised words, new answers and in some cases, additions and deletions of OASIS questions. One common thread in the changes: CMS revised at least seven process measures to identify at discharge whether agencies followed through with patients’ intervention plans. This pertains to pressure ulcers, depression, pain, diabetic foot care, heart failure, falls risk and medication. Agencies have until Jan. 13, 2009, to comment on the new draft.

- Marci Heydt

Click here for the October 2007 OASIS-C draft to compare the changes.

Click here to read a statement CMS released about the latest OASIS-C draft.

Click here to see a crosswalk between the current OASIS and the latest OASIS-C draft.

New CMS coding guidance threatens episode payments

Recently released CMS coding guidance could reduce episode payments by $300 or more, according to industry experts. The most notable change: The new rules have tightened documentation requirements on plans of care, requiring all secondary diagnoses to be listed specifically on the POC. The rule also has restricted the use of secondary coding diagnosis fields M0240 and M0246 and forced coders to take extra steps to validate certain codes before placing them on patient claims.

- Sara Jackson

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