CMS Plans to Publish SNF VBP Performance Later This Fall
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has just notified LeadingAge and LeadingAge NY that they intend to publish national results for the Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Value-Based Purchasing (VBP) program on CMS.gov and Nursing Home Compare later this fall. CMS also plans to send a listserv notification when the information is available for facilities. If there are changes to this information resulting from corrections made in Phase One, CMS will update the public reporting files accordingly.
While Phase Two review and correction performance scores and multipliers are considered final, please note that Phase One review and corrections continue until March 31, 2019. As corrections for measure rates are submitted, this may impact VBP scores and payment multipliers provided in the August 2018 Confidential Performance Score Reports. All results will be considered final for FY 2019 at the end of Phase One.
By way of reference, “Phase One” of the Review and Corrections process allows SNFs to review and submit corrections to the facility-level information that will be made publicly available. Requests are accepted until March 31st following delivery of the confidential report containing facility-level information and must be submitted to the SNFVBPinquiries@cms.hhs.gov mailbox. CMS reviews the request and notifies the SNF of any changes that may result. “Phase Two” allows SNFs to review and submit correction requests to their performance scores and rank only, found in the annual performance score report. CMS will not consider any patient-level information or measure rate correction requests during Phase Two. Phase Two requests are only accepted for 30 calendar days following the annual performance score reports being made available. A SNF must submit correction requests to the SNFVBPinquiries@cms.hhs.gov mailbox. CMS will review the request and notify the SNF of any changes that may result.
Existing law requires that VBP apply to SNF fee-for-service payments starting Oct. 1, 2018, based on an initial performance period of calendar year 2017. The VBP is being funded with a 2 percent withhold from SNF Part A payments that can be partially earned back based on each facility’s rehospitalization rate and level of improvement.
Contact: Dan Heim, dheim@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8866