On November 16, 2015, CMS released a final rule that bundles acute-care payments for knee and hip replacement surgeries, the most common type of inpatient surgeries for Medicare beneficiaries, with some 400,000 performed in 2004.
If you've been working in case management, you already know that your job has gotten a lot more complicated in recent years. The tasks at hand may even be more daunting if you're a department director who is responsible for complying with a host of different mandates that continue to grow by the day.
Compliance with the 2-midnight rule can be tricky for many organizations, which has left many case managers with nagging questions about how to get it right. We got the following questions from our readers and asked two of our experts to weigh in.
A new proposed rule aimed at reducing readmission rates and improving patient care could bring big changes for case management?in some instances requiring hospitals to nearly double the number of full-time case managers they have on staff, say experts.
As the year rolls to a close and you start to look forward to 2016, it's time to step back, look at your program, and set some goals for next year. Karen Zander, RN, MS, CMAC, FAAN, principal and co-owner of The Center for Case Management in Wellesley, Massachusetts, says it's always a good idea for case managers to stick to tried and true best practices that have been proven effective over time.
Identify the new audit process that will be used by one of the two quality improvement organizations in charge of short stays under the 2-midnight rule.
