Home Health & Hospice Week

Watch out for retaliation against your hospice if an employee reports. Hospices should get ready to add an awkward new provision to their contracts with long-term care facilities. In a June Survey & Certification Memo, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services directs its state survey agencies to enforce a crime reporting requirement for federally funded long-term care facilities. The Affordable Care Act "requires specific individuals in applicable long-term care facilities to report any reasonable suspicion of crimes committed against a resident of that facility," says memo S&C: 11-30-NH. And guess who's on that list of "specific individuals" -- hospice staff who are working in long-term care facilities. Under the requirement, hospice staff who suspect a crime must report it to both surveyors and law enforcement. In the memo, CMS spells out possible deficiency citations for a hospice provider related to the new rule: §418.52(b)(4)-L508 -- The hospice must ensure that all [...]