Home Care Providers Brace for Tighter HIPAA Enforcement

Posted on 20. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Breaking News.

Transitioning your home health aides to handheld electronic documentation? Read this first.

There’s a health privacy and security brewing that doesn’t appear to have much to do with home care, but there are some big reasons HHAs should…

Full Article & Comments

Avoid These Pressure Ulcer Land Mines On OASIS C

Posted on 13. Jan, 2010 by sanjay.aikat in Hot Topics.

Best bet: Start by learning what stage each item asks about.

You should be hitting the pressure ulcer items heavily in your OASIS C training, or you’ll be paying the price in your reimbursement and outcomes. Don’t expect to make…

Full Article & Comments

Test Yourself: What ‘Flu Season’ Means In OASIS C

Posted on 13. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Tool Kit.

Delve into CMS’s supplemental OASIS C guidance for the answer.

Confusing wording could trip up your OASIS coding for vaccination process measures, if you don’t learn an important distinction. When you answer “yes” to M1040, you’d better make sure four…

Full Article & Comments

Home Care Washington Watch

Posted on 13. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Breaking News.

Tens of billions in home care cuts are working their way through Congress.

Home care providers need to brace for reimbursement woes if Congress finally passes its health care reform package.

After House and Senate passage of their respective reform…

Full Article & Comments

Home Care Worker Guards Homeland Security

Posted on 11. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Did You Know?.

Home care patient bragged he could hide explosives in his wheelchair.

We all know home care workers are heros, but we might think of them more as Florence-Nightingale heros rather than save-the-planet heros. Revise that image now. A tip from…

Full Article & Comments

HEAT On the Lookout for Diabetic Shoe Insert Fraud

Posted on 05. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Breaking News.

Round up the usual suspects.

New places. The usual suspects — with one quirky new twist.

Last year, the Medicare Fraud Strike Force or ‘HEAT’ busted Medicare fraud rings in Miami, FL;…

Full Article & Comments

Brush Up On Your Latin For OASIS C Success

Posted on 05. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Tool Kit.

Note this subtle difference in wording to score OASIS C accurately.

Question: When I read through the OASIS C items, I see that some questions contain “e.g.,” some use “i.e.,” and some have both. Do these variations affect my…

Full Article & Comments

Health Care Reform Update: Home Care Cuts Advance in Congress

Posted on 05. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Money Matters.

Senate passes billions in reimbursement cuts.

Congress has yet to pass the final word on home care cuts this year, but the outlook is grim.

On Christmas Eve, the Senate approved massive health care reform legislation which includes cuts to…

Full Article & Comments

Trends: Percentage of Family Caregivers Employing Paid Help Decreases

Posted on 05. Jan, 2010 by Editor in Did You Know?.

Check out the profile of adults caring for seniors over 50

Family caregivers taking care of a person who’s not in a nursing home are less likely these days to employ paid help than they were in 2004, according to…

Full Article & Comments

Hospice Research: Racial Disparities Impact End-of-Life Care

Posted on 16. Dec, 2009 by Editor in Did You Know?.

Black patients are more likely to express trust on God’s will.

Black cancer patients may find that their dying wishes aren’t heeded as frequently as their white counter-parts.

A new study from Boston-based Dana-Farber Cancer Institute found that black cancer…

Full Article & Comments