Enforcement of the Red Flags Rules designed to protect against identity theft begins August 1, 2009. Since twice delaying enforcement from the original compliance date of November 2, 2008 and the extended date of May 1, 2009, the FTC has created additional resources for organizations to help them comply with the law. The resources are available at the FTC’s Red Flags Rule microsite. Some of the resources available include:
For further detail on Red Flag Rules, see von Briesen & Roper’s Health Law Bulletin: “Red Flag Rules: Are They Applicable to You?”
On July 9, important new information was added to CMS’s Hospital Compare web site. The new information includes data concerning how often patients return to a hospital within thirty days after being discharged for heart attack, heart failure, and pneumonia. Previously, the site only included mortality rates for these three conditions. CMS believes 30-day readmission rates are a good indicator of how well the hospital treated the patient the first time around. Hospital readmission rates are also believed to be a key indicator of reduced quality of health care and a key factor in increasing hospital costs. Thus reducing readmission rates is an important component of President Obama’s health care reform agenda. CMS believes that including this data on the Hospital Compare web site, along with including information that the hospital’s mortality and readmission rate is “better than,” “no different from,” or “worse than” other hospitals, will prompt hospitals to work toward achieving the level of the top-performing hospitals in the country.
You can read CMS’s entire press release concerning the new ratings here.
The Department of Health and Human Services’ Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has again granted The Joint Commission deeming authority for the accreditation of critical access hospitals.
The CMS designation means that critical access hospitals accredited by The Joint Commission may choose to be “deemed” as meeting Medicare and Medicaid certification requirements. While accreditation through The Joint Commission is voluntary, those who choose to be accredited are not required to undergo a CMS survey. CMS’s notice of approval is effective through November 21, 2011.
The new Wisconsin Budget, signed into law on June 29, 2009, expands leave rights under the Wisconsin Family Medical Leave Act (“WFMLA”) to same-sex and opposite-sex domestic partners. Wisconsin employers who are subject to the WFMLA should immediately update their practices and policies to comply with these new requirements.
The amendment defines “domestic partner” to include same-sex couples who have registered their domestic partnership with the Register of Deeds in their county of residence and same-sex or opposite-sex couples who are not registered but who must meet more stringent requirements. Read more…
Quality concerns, patient demands and physician staffing all contribute to providers’ focus on supervision of mid-level providers (MLPs). Regarding services provided as incident to outpatient therapeutic services, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) added to the confusion by issuing a “clarification” in the CY 2009 Outpatient Prospective Payment System (OPPS) Rule that tightened supervision requirements for on-campus and in-hospital outpatient departments. Since then, however, CMS has attempted to make this “clarification” more clear with the issuance of its proposed CY 2010 OPPS Rule. This article discusses CMS’s proposed rule, with a specific focus on the proposed revisions to the supervision requirements for incident to outpatient therapeutic services. Read more…
Wisconsin’s new state budget includes revisions to Wisconsin Chapters 146 and 51 that resolve several conflicts between state and federal patient privacy laws. Among other things, the new provisions expand the definition of “patient health care records” to including records made by ambulance and emergency medical technicians, and to include billing-related information. The provisions clarify that domestic partners may access their partners’ medical records, including mental health treatment records, in certain situations. The new provisions also require health care providers to provide patients with access to their health records within 21 days of receipt of a request for access. The new revisions are effective July 1, 2009. The pages from the budget that apply to Wis. Stats. 146.81, 146.83, and 51.30 are available here. The entire budget can be read here.
The hospital assessment passed earlier this year has been increased by 20% by the new state budget. Hospitals will now receive additional Medicaid payments and the state will receive additional funding to help support the state’s Medicaid programs. The BadgerCare – Core Plan, expanding coverage to low-income, uninsured childless adults, is one such program whose implementation was dependent on the expanded hospital assessment.
CMS released these proposed rules on July 1, 2009. You can view the FY 2010 PFS Proposed Rule here (1128 pages) and the FY 2010 OPPS Proposed Rule here (1227 pages).
The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals just issued a favorable decision for a hospital-employer in David Farr v. St. Francis Hospital and Health Centers, No. 08-3203. The court affirmed the Hospital’s termination of a male employee for accessing pornography and malware on a computer he shared with fellow respiratory therapists. The male respiratory therapist alleged that he was fired because he was male, and also alleged state law claims involving defamation and breach of the covenant of fair dealing implied by the Hospital’s employee handbook. The Seventh Circuit upheld the district court decision dismissing all causes of action.
The case is a good example of the importance and strength of a thorough internal investigation. The case notes that the plaintiff never raised a sex discrimination complaint during the Hospital’s internal grievance process. Though this fact may not have played a major role in the court’s reasoning for dismissing these particular claims, the court’s mention of plaintiff’s failure to allege sex discrimination at the grievance stage arguably establishes that effective internal grievance procedures can help employers show good faith in termination cases.
