AHA comments on IRF, IPF and SNF proposed rules

Commenting today on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ proposed rules for the inpatient rehabilitation, inpatient psychiatric and skilled nursing facility prospective payment systems for fiscal year 2022, AHA said it appreciates that the streamlined IRF proposed rule allows IRFs and their partners to continue to focus on local COVID-19 responses.  
 
AHA also voiced support for proposals to align certain IPF and inpatient teaching policy provisions and remove certain chart-abstracted quality measures from the IPF quality reporting program, but urged CMS to reconsider adopting certain IPF quality measures at this time.
 
AHA said it appreciates that the SNF rule does not revise the “parity adjustment” for the new case-mix system known as the Patient Driven Payment Model, which was implemented in FY 2020, and that any future adjustment would be implemented on a prospective basis, actions it said will help the field address the devastating effects of the pandemic.