Medicare & Medicaid
CMS is now calling for clinicians, hospitals, and critical access hospitals to use a 90-day EHR reporting period in 2016 - down from a full calendar year for returning participants in the government's EHR Incentive Program. They also proposed lowering the bar for achieving Stage 3 objectives, eliminating the Clinical Decision Support and Computerized Provider Order Entry objectives and measures for eligible hospitals and critical access hospitals.
Parents who say their children with autism are legally entitled to applied behavioral analysis -- or ABA -- treatment are butting heads with Texas officials. And without Medicaid coverage, they must either forgo the therapy or find a way to pay for individual insurance plans that help pick up the costs.
Proposal would eliminate any potential financial pressure clinicians may feel to over-prescribe pain medications, especially opioids.
American Hospital Association-backed report says ignoring socioeconomic differences may create the appearance of quality issues where there are none.
Many clinicians report feeling pressure to overprescribe opioids because scores on the pain management questions are tied to Medicare payments.
CMS said the initiative is part of a broader effort to improve care and spend money more wisely by making use of available data.
Theft of a CHCS mobile device compromised the protected health information of hundreds of nursing home residents, according to the federal agency.
Risk adjustment transfers funds from issuers with low risk to plans with high actuarial risk.
Highest paid physician types for 2015 were nuclear medicine, neurological surgery; orthopedic surgery; radiology; and nueromusculorskeletal medicine.
Latest effort still falls short of what's needed, says American Hospital Association.