Tag Archives: CoPs

Emergency Preparedness

How to conduct a Hazards and Vulnerabilities Risk Assessment

Look for this picture on the Home Health Solutions Facebook Page every day during our 10-day Countdown to Emergency Preparedness and comment to win helpful EP products! 

THURSDAY, Oct. 19 Giveaway
TIP #4: WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG?

One of the key components of new Emergency Preparedness Programs which CMS is requiring home health agencies to have in place by the November deadline is an All Hazards Risk Vulnerabilities Assessment.

If you’re still wondering exactly this is and where your agency can download its risk assessment form, we have some disappointing news. There is no standard risk vulnerabilities assessment form agencies can download and fill out to comply. CMS leaves the actual format of the risk assessment – whether it will be a form or even a full, written report with a chapter-by-chapter analysis — to the discretion of the home health agency.

You will see many different versions and samples of suggested risk assessments all over the internet, ranging from basic to complex.

(Because we like things made easy, and because we believe Surveyors appreciate being able to quickly find information, Home Health Solutions suggests using an easy-to-read form for the risk assessment. We provide a fairly simple form in an easy-to-follow 12-step Emergency Preparedness Plan Assembly Kit we sell in the HHS online store.)

Whichever format your risk assessment takes, bear in mind that the easier it is to read, with information presented clearly and concisely, the more likely Surveyors are to look at it favorably. Surveyors are human, too – and no one likes wading through a disorganized mess or too much information.

CMS does provide some guidance about the risk assessment. Your agency will need to determine your vulnerability (based in large measure on your geographic location and the history there of previous events) to all natural or man-made disasters, including weather-related catastrophes such as winter storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, flooding, wildfires, etc. You’ll also need to evaluate your vulnerability to non-weather emergencies, such as nuclear power plant explosions or acts of terrorism.

Each agency’s risk assessment will be based on your particular location and the likelihood of hazardous conditions for you. An agency in North Dakota, for example, will probably devote a great deal of space on its risk assessment to the likelihood of winter storms, so that it can undertake detailed planning for continuity of patient care during ice or blizzards. But an agency in Florida will almost certainly devote most of its space to tropical storms or hurricanes with the potential for high winds and flooding – and may even devote space to the potential for sinkholes.

Your agency’s risk assessment shouldn’t necessarily look just like assessments for other agencies in your state. Is your agency located within a few blocks of a major metropolitan airport? You may want to include the possibility of a major plane crash impacting the building in which your agency is housed. Does the river in your small town flood in years with heavy spring rains, closing roadways? Your risk assessment should highlight that risk. Do frequent rock slides impact roadways in the mountainous areas where you serve clients? That is a risk specific to your area, and should be addressed in your risk assessment.

Remember that CMS loves data, so build your risk assessment to the extent possible around local data showing previous incidences of ice storms, tornadoes, forest fires, etc. which have occurred in your area. Your local Emergency Management Agency should be able to help provide data, or direct you to state web sites where it can be found.

Bear in mind, however, that your risk assessment does not need to be a lengthy and detailed incident report of every power outage or tornado watch experienced in your area over the last few decades. You will only need to provide a comprehensive overview of risks specific to your area.

Think of the risk assessment as your agency’s clear, concise and carefully constructed answer to these two questions:

1. What could possibly go wrong?

2. How will we respond if it does?

The goal is to demonstrate that you have thoughtfully and carefully evaluated many different situations likely to make it difficult for you to care for your patients, seeking input from qualified emergency management officials who are trained in dealing with crisis situations, and that you have set in place mechanisms to maintain continuity of care even under the most challenging circumstances.

CMS specifically uses the term “all hazards” in defining the risk assessment, so be sure to weigh all potential hazards, including those which are not weather related. Your assessment should reflect your agency’s vulnerability to cyber attacks, workplace shootings, hostage situations, acts of terror and other man-made crises which could negatively impact your ability to care for your patients.

On its web site, CMS says the risk assessment should include (but is not limited to):

  • Hazards likely in geographic area
  • Care-related emergencies
  • Equipment and power failures
  • Interruption in communications, including cyber attacks
  • Loss of all/portion of facility
  • Loss of all/portion of supplies

The CMS list above provides the framework for your risk assessment. Flesh it out and make it specific to your agency, and you will have this important element of your Emergency Preparedness Program in place.

The clock is ticking. Check out all the helpful CoPs products HHS offers in our online store, The Solutions Shop: www.homehealthsolutionsllc.com/the-solutions-shop

Emergency Preparedness

CMS requires two exercises before November deadline

Look for this picture on the Home Health Solutions Facebook Page every day during our 10-day Countdown to Emergency Preparedness and comment to win helpful EP products! 

WEDNESDAY Oct. 18 Giveaway
TIP #3:  WAIT. A FULL-SCALE DRILL BY WHEN?

Are you still working hard to get your home health agency’s new Emergency Preparedness Program in place by November so that you can meet the CMS deadline and begin all the detailed planning for those two exercises you’re required to stage — the full-scale community disaster drill and a second, smaller-scale  table-top exercise?

We sure hope not.

For compliance, your agency will need to have already staged both these required exercises by November. The Emergency Preparedness Requirements Final Rule was posted to the Federal Register more than a year ago, on Sept. 8, 2016, and the regulation went into effect just two months later, on Nov. 16, 2016. Medicare and Medicaid Participating Providers and Suppliers were given one year from the effective date to comply and implement all regulations. When that year is up – in just one more month – home health agencies will be subject to citations for non-compliance if they have not yet staged both exercises this past year.

The Emergency Preparedness Requirement was confusing to many home health agencies. We talk to agencies every day who are so busy caring for patients and taking care of agency business that they have trouble juggling regulatory deadlines – especially this year, when the start date for new Conditions of Participation was originally set for a July implementation, and then delayed until January.

Isn’t the Emergency Preparedness requirement part of the new CoPs, agencies ask us. Don’t we have until January now? Not for your Emergency Preparedness Programs, we explain.

While the Emergency Preparedness requirement is included as part of the new CoPs, and while  the start date for CoPs was pushed back six months, a delay was never granted for the original Emergency Preparedness Requirements Final Rule which posted to the Federal Register back in 2016.

The clock began ticking then.

Time is up.

Some agencies which experienced actual emergencies this year may be exempt from the community-wide disaster drill (please see Tuesday’s Tip #2).

But agencies which did not activate emergency plans this year and conduct an evaluation afterward are expected to comply with the full-scale community-wide drill prior to next month’s deadline.

In either case, agencies also will be expected to have staged tabletop exercises, in which mock disasters are conducted via paper.

If you’re feeling panicked by the approaching deadline, please visit our online store today and check out our 12-step Emergency Preparedness Plan Assembly Kit. We’re not going to mislead you; it’s getting late in the game to comply, and it will be very difficult now to meet the deadline if you have not yet begun. But don’t wait another day. Our Kit will make it faster and easier.

Click here to visit The Solutions Shop, our online store. 

 

Conditions of Participation

Our CoPs COMPANION puts a trusted industry expert at your side

We’ve sifted through all the new Conditions of Participation, thought about how best to help you apply the new requirements in your home health agency’s operation, and the result is the CoPs COMPANION, four books filled with helpful charts, tools and detailed information about each aspect of the administrative, operational and procedural changes ahead for the home health field.

Take a look at just a few of the highlights:

In Volume I: We detail all your new responsibilities, from Start of Care right through Transfer and Discharge. You’ll find helpful charts showing which information must be given to who, and on what schedule, as well as what to include in the new Transfer or Discharge Summary you’ll have to prepare. We also offer a helpful tool for making the decision about whether to re-certify or discharge a patient.

In Volume II: We list the “checkpoints” for when you’ll need to notify the physician or conference with the interdisciplinary team to meet new care coordination requirements. You’ll read about the role of the new Clinical Manager, and see a job description. We also explain how to meet new requirements for patient participation in the development of care plans.

In Volume III: We’ve put together a step-by-step guide to take the mystery out of QAPI, and our helpful documentation worksheet will walk you through how to create reports detailing your agency’s PIPs. Since the Infection Control program required by CoPs will need to be an integral part of your agency’s QAPI program, we’ve featured it here, too.

In Volume IV:  We show you how and why CMS is demanding more accountability from home health agencies – from very specific new demands on the governing body to higher standards for agency administrators.

And this is just SOME of the helpful information we’ve packed into this informational series.

It’s  designed to put a trusted industry expert at your side through the transition process,  making compliance easy!

At less than $60 per book, how can you afford NOT to have this detailed reference series?

Click here to visit The Solutions Shop now to check out this 4-volume series plus all our other helpful CoPs products.

Conditions of Participation, Home Health News

CMS announcement did not mention Emergency Preparedness Plans

 Good news, bad news

There’s good news in the home health field this week:

Yes, there is a possibility that the federal Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services will delay the implementation of revised Conditions of Participation, allowing home health agencies extra time to make the many clinical, organizational and administrative changes which will be required.

The bad news is that a possible delay doesn’t mean agencies can afford to wait to begin working on meeting the new requirements.

In fact, Home Health Solutions Owner and President J’non Griffin advises home health agencies to move forward with all changes as if there will be no change in the effective date established under current law.

The need to begin work now on the many changes required under CoPs is especially true for creating Emergency Preparedness Plans, which will likely be one of the more labor-intensive and intimidating new requirements for agencies, J’non said.

Conditions of Participation will require home health agencies to have in place a detailed Emergency Preparedness Plan including hazard risk assessments for their specific communities, communication plans for any natural or man-made disaster and many other specific components.

Under the Final Rule approved in January, agencies have until November 2017 to put together this complex Emergency Preparation Plan, and have in place measures for conducting community-coordinated disaster drills to practice how they would handle their patients and work with other facilities during an actual emergency situation. In addition, the agency’s emergency preparedness program will need to include individual plans for its patients.

Last week’s announcement by CMS that it will consider a delayed start date for CoPs, pushing the current effective date from July 13 2017 to January 13 2018 made no mention of a new time frame for the Emergency Preparedness Plan requirement.

Until otherwise notified, agencies must assume that the November  2017 deadline stands, according to Home Health Solutions LLC Owner and President J’non Griffin.

There is no guarantee that CMS will approve any delays, despite last week’s announcement, and agencies could be risking non-compliance if they do not move forward with changes, J’non said.
“CMS has opened a 60-day public comment period to solicit information it will use in making the determination about whether to delay the start date for CoPs,” J’non said. “But it is important to remember that if the start date is not delayed at the end of the 60-day period, agencies which have not begun to make the necessary changes will not have enough time to do so by July 13.”

Need help with your Emergency Plan?

A complete Emergency Preparedness Plan Assembly Kit is one of the resources and products Home Health Solutions has created to help agencies meet the new CoPs.

The Assembly Kit and other products are featured in our new CoPs Success Catalog.  Click here to see the catalog now.

Other helpful products:
   – A complete video library overviewing new CoPs
  –  A 4-Volume Reference Guide
   – Tutorials for Home Health Aides on new requirements
   – An innovative new Patient Orientation Package which is customized for your agency 
   – Complete, done-for-you policy manuals

  You’ll find all the tools you need to meet the new CoPs in our catalog. And with our CoPs Success Bundle, you can buy EVERYTHING you need for success at one great price, without having to spend the time to pick and choose. We’ve done all the work for you! 
Conditions of Participation, Home health agencies, Uncategorized

What PCR reprieves, CoPs delay could mean

Future-gazing: A delay or not?
Either way,  there’s work to do!

It seemed almost too good to be true, like some April Fool’s Day prank offering false hope to home health agencies braced for a new onslaught of federal regulations.

Just one day before home health agencies in Florida expected to join Illinois agencies in a long-fought Pre-Claim Review (PCR) demonstration by the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services, two announcements by CMS changed the game. At least for now.

 After months of deadlock, a temporary reprieve from massive new regulatory changes – not just in Florida but nationwide – suddenly shifted from highly unlikely to plausible.

 CMS announced Friday that it would grant Florida a second reprieve from the PCR demonstration scheduled to begin April 1, suspend for at least 30 days the PCR program in Illinois which has been underway since August, and possibly give home health agencies an additional six months to prepare for new Conditions of Participation in the Medicare program.

   “These two developments made for an interesting Friday in home health,” said J’non Griffin, owner and president of Home Health Solutions LLC. “The PCR delay in Florida really was an 11th hour save. The clock was ticking, and agency personnel were attending last-minute PCR training workshops every day last week in cities all across Florida to get the information and training they needed to be ready for the PCR launch.”

 But brand new CMS administrator Seema Verma, who was just confirmed to her position at the Department of Health and Human Services on March 13, was also seeking information last week. She asked to meet directly with home health care providers and advocates from both Florida and Illinois, where the nation’s first PCR demonstration began last summer. The new CMS administrator said she wanted to hear their concerns about the impact of increasing regulatory demands on home health.

   Following that meeting, CMS on Friday announced plans for a 60-day public comment period to seek information that will be evaluated in determining whether to delay the implementation of new CoPs, standards which are widely expected to be difficult, time-consuming and costly for agencies to put into place. Under the current timeframe, agencies are required to meet new CoPs by July 13. The six-month delay, if approved, will give agencies until January, 2018, to make the necessary changes.

Soon after that announcement, word came from CMS that the PCR demonstration in Florida would no longer begin on April 1 as scheduled — and that the ongoing PCR demonstration in Illinois would be suspended for at least 30 days. CMS offered no further timetable for PCRs to resume, but promised a 30-day notice will be provided before that happens.

Relief, hope — and politics

Home health professionals across the country greeted Friday’s news with a mixture of relief and cautious hope for a changing climate in Washington D.C. regarding federal regulations on home care.

New Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price has been described as knowledgeable about and supportive of many home health issues by William Dombi, Vice President of Law for the National Association of Home Care. At the 2017 Illinois Home Care and Hospice Conference last month, Dombi painted Price as a potential ally for home health, telling attendees that Price was considering supporting a CoPs delay.

But less than 100 days into a new administration, the Department of Health and Human Services headed by Price is still coming together, with many of its senior positions still unfilled.
And, as battles continue between lawmakers over the government’s specific role in health care, many of our nation’s health care policies have yet to be determined, much less put into place.

“It’s definitely a good sign for top officials in D.C. to actively seek input from home health and listen to our concerns, but there are still a great many unknowns right now,” J’non said. “No one really knows exactly how all this is going to play out.”

The future of PCRs and CoPs

What will the delays in Florida and Illinois mean for PCR demonstrations?

Industry experts believe it is likely that CMS will make changes to the PCR model before continuing with the demonstration first launched in Illinois last August. The demonstration in that state proved to be so chaotic, confusing and largely unsuccessful in its initial months that CMS was forced to pull the plug on expansions planned for Florida the following October and into Texas, Michigan and Massachusetts by the beginning of the year.

With the issues that plagued Illinois corrected, what might the revised demonstration look like?

“It really isn’t possible to say for certain at this point,” J’non said. “It seems more important to note that the PCR demonstration will go forward. This is a delay, and not a repeal. Agencies in all states still need to add PCR readiness to their ongoing training efforts.”

Under the current model, agencies in states where the PCR demonstration operates have the choice to participate or not. However, those who do not submit the proper paperwork for review prior to filing actual claims will automatically lose 25 percent of any Medicare reimbursement on claims not previewed.There has been no word at this time that the 25 percent reduction for non-participation will change.

While dramatic, last-minute PCR suspensions in Florida and Illinois grabbed most of the attention on Friday, the CMS announcement regarding a possible delay in the implementation of new Conditions of Participation could have a more immediate impact on most of the nation’s 30,000 home health providers.

The implementation of most new CoPs would be delayed until January 13, 2018, under the proposed rule.

Agencies would have extra time to meet some of the Quality Assurance and Performance Improvement (QAPI) standards required. Phase-in requirements would give agencies until July 13, 2018, to implement performance improvement projects, allowing six months after the January 2018 start date to collect the data they will be required to use in their data-driven performance improvement projects beginning in July 2018.

Administrators would be affected 
   Additionally, the proposed rule would grandfather all administrators employed by agencies prior to January 2018, so that they do not have to meet the new personnel requirements identified in the revised CoPs. 

  Of particular interest to agency administrators is what new personnel requirements will mean for future employment, and their ability to move from a grandfathered position at their current agency to an administrator position at a different agency.

Under the new CoPs, administrators who do not meet the requirements would lose their grandfathered exemption when they leave one agency to take a position at another agency, J’non said.
The clock is ticking

One of the primary arguments for delay of a start date for new CoPs has been concern about the lack of interpretive guidelines, which Surveyors will use to evaluate whether agencies have met the standards.

Agencies have expressed concerns they are not certain exactly what Surveyors will be looking for, particularly in the areas of data-driven performance improvement projects.
CMS agreed, in its announcement on Friday, that there is merit to that argument, and that is one of the reasons the delay is being considered.

“With so many other major clinical and operational changes to implement in such a short period of time before July 13, which is the start date effective under current law, there has been growing concern in the industry about the lack of time in which to put all of it into place,” J’non said.

   New Conditions of Participation were approved in January, giving agencies only six months to make the required changes. It was the first time in almost three decades that CMS addressed the standards set out for home health agencies under CoPs.

“With such a limited amount of time, agencies really need to be making the necessary changes now, without waiting on interpretive guidelines,” J’non said. “Guidelines are more for the benefit of Surveyors. Agencies must meet the standards as they are set out in the CoPs.

“It’s important to remember that the delay is only under consideration at this point, and the July 13 start date could remain in effect,” she said. Many agencies will not have the resources to make necessary changes on their own, especially under the current time frame, and will need to outsource much or all of the work, J’non said.

Even if the delay is approved, and extra time is granted, many of the new requirements will be so labor-intensive that agencies will still need to rely on outsourcing, she said.

Delays aren’t repeals

  J’non offered this advice to agencies wondering what these delays may mean and how they will affect preparation timelines:
“It’s important to note that, as with PCRs, a possible delay is not the same thing as a repeal,” J’non cautioned. “Agencies need to proceed as if the July 13 start date will remain in effect. If they wait, and the start date is not delayed at the close of the 60-day comment period, it will be too close to July to be able to implement the required changes by the deadline.”

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article first appeared in The Absolute Agency, a free monthly e-newsletter published by Home Health Solutions as a best-practices guide for agency administrators.
To subscribe, click here.

Conditions of Participation, Home health agencies, Home health management

10 Things Your Agency Can Do NOW to prepare for new CoPs


EDITOR’S NOTE: This article first appeared in the March 1 issue of The Absolute Agency, a free best practices resource emailed to agency administrators each month. To subscribe, click here.

It’s been almost 30 years since CMS changed the rules for home health agencies participating in Medicare, but the summer of 2017 will usher in both small and large changes in operational aspects of home health care.
Agencies must be prepared by July to meet most of the newly revised Conditions of Participation, although emergency preparedness plans won’t have to be in place until November.
If you’re feeling intimidated by scope of new changes on the horizon,  Home Health Solutions owner and president J’non Griffin has this advice about how to swallow an elephant:
One bite at a time.
 Home Health Solutions will be focusing in greater detail on these and other aspects of the revised CoPs during the next few months, but there’s no need to wait to get your agency ready for the changes. Here’s our To-Do List of 10 simple tweaks, small changes and easy projects you can do right now to prepare for July and get ahead of the game.

1. Create An Organizational Chart.
If your agency doesn’t have one, start one.  Establish a clear chain of command.
Already have an organizational chart? Great! Make sure that it has a Clinical Manager who is responsible for making assignments, coordinating patient care and performing many of the functions currently falling under the duties of a Supervising Nurse.  Having a Clinical Manager is one of the new CoP requirements.
This doesn’t have to be one person. It’s OK to have more than one Clinical Manager on your chart.  Neither will your Clinical Manager have to be an R.N. Under new CoPs, the professional in this role may be nurse, therapist, social worker, even a doctor.
Your organizational chart will need to be in writing, along with all other agency policies.

2.  Create or Review Existing Job Descriptions.
 You’ll need a job description in writing for each person who works at your agency – and the job description will need to include licensing requirements as applicable for specific positions. This will vary from state to state, so resist the urge to copy a great job description from an agency in another state.  You’ll have to make sure you do your homework so that your job descriptions are unique to your agency and match your state’s requirements.
Make certain, in the case of your Clinical Manager, that the job description highlights the primary responsibility as COORDINATION of services, patient care, etc.

3.  Check Your Watch. 
Now make it a habit. There’s no time like the present to start cultivating a new habit, and your entire staff is going to need to become much more time-conscious under new CoPs.  Clinicians will need to get into the habit of including the TIME in all visit notes.
There’s new wording in the CoPs, and it’s all about what time it is: time of arrival, time of departure, time that a service was provided,  and what time it was when someone on your staff spoke to a physician. It’s no longer enough to record the date on which an order was received; you’ll need to record the time, too.
Give your staff plenty of time to get into the habit; start requiring the documentation of time today.

4.  Start collecting phone numbers and contact info.
Under new patient rights established by the CoPs, you’ll be required to share with patients the phone numbers, addresses and contact information for a variety of state and federal agencies serving your area, including:
— Agency on Aging
— Center for Independent Living
— Protection and Advocacy Agency
— Aging and Disability Resource Center
— Quality Improvement Organization

5. Update Your Patient Info Packets
While you’re adding the list of numbers and contact info to the patient rights and information packets you provide to your patients at Start of Care, spend some time reviewing and evaluating exactly what you’re handing out and how well it is organized.
Is it easy to understand? Can you edit or rewrite any portion of it to make it simpler or any clearer? Does it spell out clearly how a patient, caregiver or representative is to report a problem or file a complaint – and to whom?
Under new CoPs, you’ll need to make sure to provide the patient with the name, phone number and contact information for both the agency administrator and clinical manager.
Make sure to include in writing your agency’s transfer and discharge policies. New CoPs will require you to provide this information to patients.
There are many other new patient rights requirements, too, but working now on these particular elements now can put your agency ahead of the curve.

 6.  Take steps to erase language barriers.
Make certain your agency can easily provide interpreters and copies of patients rights and information in the native language of the patient. Even if your agency does not currently serve patients who speak a language other than English, you must be prepared to overcome language barriers in the event that such a patient needs your care.
Start developing a plan now for securing interpreters as needed, and draft a written policy addressing how your agency will handle this situation should it occur.

7.  Medication Regimen Review.
Make sure you are conducting a review of all meds the patient is currently using and perform a reconciliation. Clinicians are already asked to do this as part of OASIS, but under new CoPs, your agency will be required to review all medications a patient is taking — including those prescribed by other care providers —  to identify, review and resolve any discrepancies.

8. Speed it up!
Work on getting faster in every aspect of your agency’s operation. Tighten your deadlines and stress to your staff the importance of streamlining and expediting paperwork.  Under new CoPs, you’ll need to have summaries prepared much faster, meet expedited turnaround times, be able to provide complete information to patients by the next home visit upon request, and follow through on discharged patients within a 5 business day window, providing a discharge summary to the agency, physician or other entity into whose care the patient is being transferred.

9.  Take a new look at how to safeguard private health information.
Under new CoPs, you’ll need a detailed written policy establishing procedures to be followed in the event of loss, theft or destruction in any manner of a computer on which private medical records are stored.  This is a good time to start detailing that policy.

10. Start working on your agency’s Emergency Preparedness Plan. 
Agencies have until November to get together the detailed Emergency Preparedness Plan required by new CoPs – but this is a complex undertaking with many components, and getting started today is the best course of action.
Start by calling your local Emergency Preparedness Agency today to set up a time to meet with a representative who can help you with one of the most intimidating pieces of this project for many agencies: the coordination of communitywide resources and other facilities.  FEMA already has access to much of the information you will need for your plan, including detailed studies and existing coordination plans which can be incorporated into the unique plan you will be required to craft for your agency.
As an example, you’ll need both a Hazardous Risk Assessment and a Communication Plan. Flood Risk Assessments from FEMA for your area may provide the specific information you will need to include in your own assessment. Your local agency may also help you develop a workable Communication Plan specifying how to get in touch with staff, patients, patient families and caregivers, as well as other facilities in the community in the event of a disaster which takes down phone and/or power lines, knocks out satellite communications and makes normal channels of communication impossible.

Cross these 10  items off your To-Do List and you’ll already be 10 sizeable bites into the elephant as the calendar turns toward July, ushering in the revised Conditions of Participation.
Bon appetit!