We want to alert you to legislation that is being drafted that would make significant changes to the Medicare hospice program. Yesterday Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) released a discussion draft of this legislation and his office will be seeking feedback from stakeholders over the coming weeks.
The draft contains primarily a mix of program integrity and payment changes, with a few other provisions related to medical review contractors, nurse practitioners' role in hospice, telehealth, hospital discharge planning, and hospice ownership transparency. We summarized the provisions in an article in yesterday's NAHC Report.
NAHC is working hard to perform more detailed analyses, and will be working with members to better understand the implications of the proposed changes. We will provide more information as it becomes available.
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Katie Wehri
Vice President of Regulatory Affairs, Quality & Compliance
NAHC
Washington, DC
202-240-9254 #3360
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