CMS rules, MAC bulletins and deadlines for home health and hospice agencies.
CMS estimates its proposed rule would raise 2027 home health payments by 2.4%, or $420 million, even with a second straight year of a 3.0% temporary cut to recover past overpayments. As of Oct. 19, no final rule had been published.
Original Medicare covers part-time or intermittent skilled care at home for people who are homebound and under a provider's plan of care. Here's who qualifies, what it costs and what's excluded.
CMS corrected a wage index error after publishing its August final rule, and the correction replaced the national rate tables. Here are the rates, cap and impact figures now in effect since Oct. 1, 2026.
The dates from CMS and the Medicare Administrative Contractors that fall between now and early January, in order, each linked to the notice behind it. One quality-reporting deadline has already passed.
Second-quarter hospice CAHPS data is due Nov. 11, and new survey guidelines apply from the first quarter of 2027. The home health CAHPS deadline just passed. Here is how the star ratings and HOPE fit in.
For elections starting Oct. 1 or later, hospices must give each patient a written notice of the items, services and drugs the hospice has determined are unrelated to the terminal illness. CMS is holding off on claim denials for three months.
Changes you make during open enrollment start Jan. 1, 2027. If you or a parent uses home health care, or may need hospice, here are the rules Medicare.gov lists and where to get free help.
An OIG audit issued in June estimated Medicare could have saved $255.1 million with MAC review of certain new hospice enrollees, and CMS concurred. A separate, active OIG audit examines home health claims billed as institutional admissions.
Home health agencies in six states choose between pre-claim and postpayment review, and those that meet CMS's 90% target can earn lighter review. Here is the framework as CMS describes it, plus Palmetto's monthly webinar.
A short annual update with one practical effect: suppliers billing these two items for patients under a home health plan of care stop running into consolidated billing edits on them.
A one-requirement transmittal with no MLN Matters article behind it. It still matters to any agency with long-stay patients and slow billing.
Two claim edits that were pulled in June are coming back with exceptions. Hospices that take transfers or are going through a change of ownership are the ones this was written for.
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