Hospice News

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

Unified Program Integrity Contractor (UPIC) auditors are taking a sharper look at nursing home room-and-board for hospice patients. Hospices have increasingly faced more regulatory scrutiny in recent years amid rising program integrity concerns, including ramped up UPIC audits , among various others.

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Hospice News

JUNE 13, 2024

Earl Blumenauer (D-Oregon) is drafting a landmark bill that, if enacted, would represent the most significant reforms to date for hospice payment and oversight. Blumenauer announced the bill, the Hospice Care Accountability, Reform, and Enforcement (Hospice CARE) Act, on Thursday at the Hospice News Elevate conference in Washington D.C.

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Hospice News

MARCH 26, 2025

Todays hospice landscape is reaching a pivotal point of evolutionary growth that has come with increased oversight as regulators seek to curb fraudulent activity in the space, according to Bill Dombi, senior counsel for the law firm Arnall Golden Gregory (AGG). What are the leading legal concerns facing hospice providers right now?

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Hospice News

SEPTEMBER 20, 2024

This is particularly true for people living in the nation’s 15,000-plus nursing homes. The grant, spread out over a five-year period, will be put toward the team’s creation of a national network structure that seeks to include more nursing home residents in clinical trials. As the U.S. Dr. Kathleen T.

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Hospice News

JUNE 3, 2024

Hospice industry organizations have voiced support for proposed updates to the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) surveys, but raised questions on the implementation timeline. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) included the updates in its proposed hospice payment rule for 2025.

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Hospice News

MARCH 29, 2023

Though evidence shows that longer hospice stays reduce costs, providers are still walking a regulatory tightrope. On one hand, longer hospice stays can lead to improved patient and family satisfaction and greater cost saving opportunities. Young told Hospice News. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the U.S.

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Hospice News

MARCH 27, 2024

Many hospices may be unprepared to cope with a large-scale disaster or a future pandemic. Last year, The Joint Commission implemented similar requirements for hospices. However, the COVID-19 pandemic exposed gaps in preparedness when it comes to hospice and palliative care. Increasingly, this factors into compliance.

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Hospice News

OCTOBER 3, 2023

Houston Hospice is opening up its inpatient unit for use by other providers. Other hospices will soon be able to admit patients to the company’s unit in the Texas Medical Center in Houston. They will be able to coordinate with Houston Hospice and deliver General Inpatient Care (GIP), helping to avoid hospital readmissions.

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Hospice News

JANUARY 11, 2023

Hospices should be required to report all instances of abuse and neglect, even if the perpetrator was not an employee, the U.S. This would bring the hospice rules in line with those used in long term care. The post GAO: CMS Should Update Rules for Hospices Reporting Abuse or Neglect appeared first on Hospice News.

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Hospice News

JULY 24, 2024

Palliative care is grossly underutilized in nursing home settings, but providers can develop new tools that could bring those services to more residents, a recent study has found. It’s inherent in the nature of the people we serve in the nursing home setting.

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Hospice News

SEPTEMBER 29, 2023

A federal judge has sentenced Jesus Virlar-Cadena, formerly a medical director for the Texas-based hospice company Merida Group, to 50 months in prison for his role in a $152 million scheme. Evidence at the trial showed that the Merida Group marketed their hospice programs through a group of companies,” the U.S.

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Hospice News

AUGUST 30, 2024

The program is designed to recognize up-and-coming industry members who are shaping the next decade of home health, hospice care, senior housing, skilled nursing, and behavioral health. Lindsay Nixon, administrator at Arbor Hospice, has been named a 2024 Future Leader by Hospice News. Time to adjust the sails!

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Hospice News

DECEMBER 5, 2022

Louisiana-based CommCare Corporation recently acquired Notre Dame Hospice and Notre Dame Home Health for an undisclosed sum. CommCare’s purchase of Notre Dame’s home health and hospice operations marks the transaction of this divestiture Its nursing home services are next in line as part of a separate deal set to close in 2023.

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Hospice News

SEPTEMBER 27, 2023

Hospices tend to see an increase in dementia patient admissions as well as home-based utilization following an acquisition by a private equity firm or a publicly traded company. After an acquisition by a public company, hospices saw a 1.4% A little more than 20% of hospice decedents in 2020 suffered from dementia, up from 18.5%

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Hospice News

MARCH 21, 2024

Members of Congress are raising questions about the continued Medicare certification for new hospices in areas rife with fraud. Though he pledged more detailed responses at a later date, Becerra told lawmakers that CMS is certifying hospices in markets where there is a need identified in the community. “I Michelle Steel (R-Calif.)

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Hospice News

JUNE 2, 2023

Hosparus Health has acquired Baptist Health Deaconess Hospice in Madisonville, Kentucky, for an undisclosed sum. Founded in 1978, Hosparus Health’s 600 employees and 500 volunteers provide care for more than 10,000 patients annually, including hospice, medical care, palliative medicine, mental health and bereavement services. “Our

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Hospice News

OCTOBER 22, 2024

Errors or other inconsistencies with the payment cap can have significant consequences for providers, and sales and marketing staff can help hospices achieve a healthy balance. The cap is designed to prevent overuse of hospice, put controls on Medicare spending and foster greater access to care among patients.

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Hospice News

JUNE 1, 2023

Patient preferences are trending towards home-based hospice care, leaving some inpatient facilities between a rock and a hard place. Meanwhile, other hospices diversify and expand their inpatient service capabilities. More patients are choosing to receive in-home hospice care,” the organization told local news.

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Hospice News

AUGUST 11, 2023

Pandemic-related headwinds that strained hospice referrals may have lingering impacts on how providers are approaching their community outreach and marketing efforts. Referrals from assisted living and skilled nursing facilities represent a large portion of hospice patients, along with hospital and health system referrals.

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Hospice News

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

She became a hospice nurse for By the Bay Health in 1996, then named Hospice of Marin, taking on various roles in clinical leadership throughout her more than 27-year tenure. “It Previously known as Hospice by the Bay, the organization rebranded in 2021 to reflect a broadening scope of services.

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Hospice News

AUGUST 17, 2022

Medicare claims for unrelated services creates serious financial and legal risks for hospice providers — even if they are not the ones who sent the bill. During recent years, payouts for non-hospice services provided to Medicare beneficiaries have tipped into the billions. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).

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Hospice News

JUNE 28, 2022

Certificate of need (CON) laws have a huge influence on hospices’ ability to expand, patients’ access to care, as well as the competitive landscape and quality of care in a given market. . It really depends on the current culture of the state,” Lund Person told Hospice News. Currently, 14 states have CON laws that include hospices.

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Hospice News

JUNE 14, 2023

Meanwhile, Medicare hospice spending is expected to more than double by 2032. The report, published today in Health Affairs , did not contain hospice-specific data. However, the annual Medicare Trustees Report for 2023 provides a more detailed look at hospice spending. annually between 2022 and 2031, reaching $7.1

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Hospice News

FEBRUARY 27, 2023

Medicare Advantage (MA) beneficiaries are more likely to enroll in hospice from a community setting than patients in traditional fee-for-service programs. million patients who elected hospice in the last 90 days of life during the years 2011, 2013, 2016 and 2018. Medicare Advantage currently does not cover hospice care.

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Hospice News

MARCH 20, 2023

Hospices are blazing trails toward growth, each provider with its own range of strategies. Regardless of providers’ disparate methods, hospice remains a high-growth industry, expanding at an annual rate of 7% to 8% annually, Bank of America (BofA) Global Research reported in TKTK. Hospice News edited comments for length and clarity.

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Hospice News

JANUARY 17, 2023

Home health and hospice provider Enhabit, Inc. The company’s more than 10,000 employees provide care from 105 hospice and 252 home health locations in 34 states. Enhabit plans to open 10 hospice de novos each year in its existing home health markets. The Denver Hospice Appoints New Medical Director.

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Hospice News

DECEMBER 13, 2024

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) ramped up auditing activity in the space while also sunsetting the hospice component of its value-based insurance design (VBID) model demonstration ahead of its initial expiration. There were just some of the themes percolating among the most-read Hospice News coverage of 2024.

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Hospice News

AUGUST 4, 2023

Alaska-based Bartlett Regional Hospital recently received approval from legislators to relaunch hospice and home health services nearly a year after a local provider shut down. Bartlett Regional Hospital in January began the process of taking over HHCJ’s hospice and home health patients to fill care delivery gaps in southeast Alaska.

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Hospice News

APRIL 12, 2024

Specialized nursing facility clinicians, or SNFists, have a strong potential to reduce hospitalizations and improve quality of care at the end of life, including access to hospice. Terminally ill nursing home often undergo burdensome experience burdensome transitions of care that adversely affect quality.

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Hospice News

MAY 2, 2023

Addus HomeCare Corporation’s (NASDAQ: ADUS) hospice segment is seeing slow but steady improvement as pandemic headwinds ease. Meanwhile, the company’s near-term acquisition sights are set more on home health than in personal care amid potential payment shifts. We believe that hospice volumes will continue to steadily improve.”

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Hospice News

FEBRUARY 12, 2025

30% of home health patients dont get initiated into care for seven days as an industry, we have to look at those numbers and decide, as leaders, its unacceptable, Compassus CEO Mike Asselta said last month during a panel discussion at the Home Care 100 conference. clinical power means mastering timely initiation of care.

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Hospice News

APRIL 4, 2024

Rural-based hospice providers face a range of challenges to improve access among their underserved patient populations. We hear from countless community providers and state association leaders that rural hospices are in financial trouble,” Hoover wrote in a recent letter to the U.S.

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Hospice News

SEPTEMBER 12, 2022

Some hospice patients rely on these plans for other health needs, such as nursing home costs. While hospice patients transition to the Medicare benefit for their end-of-life care, some may continue to need their dual-eligibility coverage to address issues that are technically outside the scope of their terminal diagnosis. “In

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GeriPal

APRIL 27, 2023

Again, this was not an AHPM or HPNA sponsored thing, but we did go around people on the street asking them two questions: what’s one thing that you’re hoping for in the future of palliative care and hospice, and what’s another thing when you’re thinking about what you’re worried about for the field?

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Hospice News

AUGUST 6, 2024

“Empath is really putting a full-life care continuum of services and programs together that is very focused on the frail, elderly population,” Empath Health CEO Jonathan Fleece told Hospice News. “As The post Empath Health, American Health Plans Launch ISNP Joint Venture appeared first on Hospice News.

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Hospice News

FEBRUARY 14, 2024

PACE programs offer a comprehensive approach to care for participants who meet certain eligibility criteria, mainly to seniors who have significant medical and non-medical needs to help them age in place and avoid the hospital or nursing homes. But they can pay us a portion of that,” Ferris told Hospice News. ”We’re

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Hospice News

MARCH 29, 2024

The 2025 proposed hospice rule is raising some questions along with payment rates. increase in hospice per diems for 2025. The agency also proposed two new quality measures and 2025 implementation of the Hospice Outcome and Patient Evaluation (HOPE) assessment tool to replace the Hospice Item Set.

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