In a surprising announcement on Friday, October 30, the Office of Inspector General (OIG) may have delivered some good news to hospitals who are diligently following prior CMS guidance on billing patients for SADs provided in the outpatient setting.
This week’s updates include an NCD for single chamber and dual chamber permanent cardiac pacemakers; a Medicare Compliance Review of Boca Raton Regional Hospital, Inc., for 2011 and 2012; and more!
A new notification requirement is coming next summer. Under the law, the Notice of Observation Treatment and Implication for Care Eligibility (NOTICE) Act, which was signed by President Barack Obama on August 6, any patient in observation who has been in the hospital for more than 24 hours must be clearly told?verbally and in writing?of his or her outpatient status. Hospital officials have to deliver this notification no more than 36 hours after the patient's outpatient treatments begin.
If your organization is like many others, you've probably still got some lingering questions about how to comply with the 2-midnight rule. During a recent HCPro webcast "Medical Necessity Documentation and Short Stays," Steven Greenspan, JD, LLM, vice president of regulatory affairs at Executive Health Resources in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania, and Kurt Hopfensperger, MD, JD, vice president of compliance and physician education for Executive Health Resources, tried to shed some light on areas of confusion.
