Home Health & Hospice Week

Once you're on a Medicare payment suspension, you shouldn't expect to get off it any time soon. In a new report, the HHS Office of Inspec-tor General examines Medicare payment suspensions that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services imposed on providers in 2007 and 2008. Of 253 suspensions during that time, CMS removed suspensions for only three providers based on rebuttals, says the report. However, only 41 of the 253 providers even submitted rebuttals for their suspensions (suspensions are not appealable). Most of the suspensions in the time period occurred in Florida, Puerto Rico, California, and Michigan, the OIG notes. More than half of the suspensions occurred in Medicare Fraud Strike Force areas. The overpayments totaled "at least" $206 million, the OIG says. CMS imposed most of the suspensions due to fraud suspicions. Therefore, only a few of the suspended providers received advance notice of the payment suspension, the [...]