12/03/2019

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Burden Reduction Rule

As a reminder, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) final burden reduction rule went into effect on Friday, November 29, 2019. This rule includes changes to medical history and physical examination (H&P) requirements, a new written notice requirement to a local hospital (hours of operation and patient population served) instead of the previous CMS requirement of a transfer agreement or admitting privileges and significant changes to emergency preparedness requirements. Please note that accrediting organizations and states can require more than CMS.

While CMS did update the actual CfC language in this guidance document, the Interpretive Guidelines for the new revisions have not been updated. Rather, the document states, “Guidance pending and will be updated in future release.” CMS indicates in this document that it plans to provide updates to the Interpretive Guidelines during Spring 2020. CMS did take this opportunity to finally provide updated language with regards to Life Safety Code changes that were made back in 2016. The information that is relevant to ASCs can be found starting on page 297 in the guidance document.