Industry Notes:
BILL AIMS TO EASE HHAs' FUEL PRICE WOES
Published on Mon May 19, 2008
But practical help may be a ways off.
Home health agencies are finding a sympathetic reception to their complaints about soaring gas prices from one influential lawmaker.
Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD) plans to introduce legislation that will reimburse HHAs on a cost basis for their fuel expenses, he says in a release. "Rather than a fixed rate, Johnson wants reimbursement rates changed to a cost-based plan, covering the true cost of the service provided," the release says.
Johnson also wrote to Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, calling on the department to investigate the effect of rising prices. "I am concerned that recent increases in the price of gasoline will adversely impact beneficiary access to these critical services," the senator said in the letter.
Proposed Bush Administration reimbursement cuts to HHA rates would hinder agencies' ability to combat the high gas prices, Johnson charges.
"I think that we may have to look at the way we reimburse for home health and allow adjustments for fuel costs," South Dakota's other senator, John Thune (R), told the Associated Press. "This is going to be a factor in whether or not a lot of these home health agencies are able to survive."
Robert Dockter, CEO and Administrator of South Dakota's Eureka Community Health Services, says high gas prices and other pressures have forced his HHA to reduce its service area by half to a 20- to 25-mile radius, Johnson's release notes. • Now that the hospice conditions of participation have finally arrived, you might be wondering about the HHA CoPs. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has established a September 2008 deadline for the HHA CoPs' publication, according to the semiannual regulatory agenda in last month's Federal Register. The notice would have to be another proposed rule, because CMS issued the last proposed rule more than 11 years ago.
The agenda puts the DME surety bond and enhanced supplier enrollment requirements in its long-term action section, with due dates of 2010 and 2009, respectively. • The OIG showcased an Iowa HHA owner in its list of enforcement actions for the first half of 2008. HHA owner Floyd Seibert and his lawyer James Golden were ordered to pay $5.7 million in restitution for Medicare and pension plan fraud, according to the OIG's semiannual report for the time period.
Seibert concealed his relationship with his various business entities, located across five states and "sold" goods and services from one of his companies to another of his companies at inflated costs, improperly passing the inflated costs on to Medicare, the OIG charges. Seibert also fraudulently passed on non-Medicare costs to the program.
Another issue: The report also reiterated the OIG's findings about hospice patients served in nursing homes. "On average, beneficiaries in nursing [...]
