Home Health & Hospice Week

CMS wants new G codes for assistant visits. You might have to use therapy assistants much less often starting next year, if the feds get their way. That's because the new home health prospective payment system proposed rule sets out new limits and billing requirements for assistants. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services proposes new documentation and assessment requirements for therapy utilization, including many items that must be completed by the therapist herself (see related story, p. 218). Case in point: Reassessments required every 30 days and on the 13th and 19th visits will have to be personally performed and documented by qualified therapists, according to the PPS proposed rule in the July 23 Federal Register. Don't expect assistant documentation to save your therapy reimbursement. "Clinical notes written by therapy assistants may supplement the clinical record" only, CMS specifies in the rule. Assistant notes "must include the date written, the [...]