LeadingAge NY Comments on SNF PPS Rule

Last week, LeadingAge NY submitted detailed written comments to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on the Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Prospective Payment System (PPS) Rule for Fiscal Year 2020. CMS received 63 comments on the proposal prior to the deadline.

In the rule, CMS proposes to increase aggregate Medicare payments to SNFs by 2.5 percent and to redefine group therapy to consist of two to six patients. The proposed rule makes no substantive changes to the Patient-Driven Payment Model (PDPM) reimbursement methodology that is set to replace RUGs in October of this year but does propose to add two new SNF Quality Reporting Program (QRP) measures, modify the specifications for calculating the Discharge to Community measure, increase the data used for QRP measures to include all payer sources, adopt several standardized patient assessment data elements starting Oct. 1, 2020, and make several other revisions and clarifications. LeadingAge NY’s memo outlining the proposed rule is available here.

Contact: Dan Heim, dheim@leadingageny.org, 518-867-8866