A Command Performant(s): RAC Audits on the Rise
As we approach the conclusion of another transformative year, we are excited to present our comprehensive year-end review, shedding light on the trends shaping the healthcare market in 2023. Our team’s keen insights and...more
If you are a healthcare provider enrolled with Medicare and Medicaid, it is imperative that you know the governmental agencies’ expectations for compliant billing and understand that the agencies constantly monitor and audit...more
Medicare pays billions of dollars in fraudulently billed claims each year despite the various tools the Medicare system has at its disposal. Because of this problem, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”)...more
Report on Medicare Compliance 30, no. 2 (January 18, 2021) - Recovery audit contractors (RACs) may soon be auditing positron emission tomography (PET) for initial treatment strategy in oncologic conditions for compliance...more
On December 2, 2020, CMS issued the calendar year (CY) 2021 Medicare Outpatient Prospective Payment System (OPPS) and Ambulatory Surgical Center (ASC) Payment System final rule. Through these policy changes, CMS seeks to...more
On December 17, 2019, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) reintroduced legislation to address the backlog of Medicare appeals cases awaiting review before an...more
Late last week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) released the CY 2020 Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (“OPPS”) final rule [CMS-1717-FC]. While many hospitals had hoped for relief from recent...more
In CMS’s continuing effort to take “a strategic approach to protecting taxpayer dollars and reducing regulation to put patients over paperwork,” Administrator Seema Verma recently highlighted changes to the Recovery Audit...more
A federal appeals court issued a significant ruling last week in relation to the ongoing backlog of Medicare claims appeals. It potentially gives providers a new way to seek relief when Medicare comes to collect money that an...more
The federal government recently awarded new contracts for Medicare recovery audits, and recovery audit contractors (“RACs”) will start showing up at hospitals, home health providers, and other facilities any time. But this...more
Perhaps lost amid the healthcare news coverage of competing proposals regarding “Medicare for All” and the repeal of Obamacare, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) last month announced the expansion of its...more
Effective September 12, 2017, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will implement changes to ensure that complex reviews for coverage determinations are performed by Registered Nurses (RNs), therapists, or...more
Last week, a number of health care industry associations sent letters to Congress detailing ways in which the government could relieve them of the burdens associated with “red tape.” The letters are in response to the first...more
The final quarter of 2016 ended with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announcing Performant Recovery, Inc. (Performant) as the new national Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) to focus solely on Home Health,...more
Originally published in Haig, Business and Commercial Litigation in Federal Courts, Fourth Edition §§ 87:1 et seq. © 2016 American Bar Association. This chapter discusses federal court litigation relating to health care...more
CMS Names Latest Round of RAC Contracts – On October 31, 2016, CMS announced it awarded contracts for its Medicare Fee-for-Service Recovery Audit Contractors (RAC) to Performant Recovery, Inc. (Region 1), Cotiviti, LLC...more
Over the past decade, health care providers seeking to challenge Medicare claim denials have faced increasing delays in reaching what many consider the most important step in the Medicare appeals process - a hearing before an...more
On May 13, 2016, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (“GAO”) released a report on the review activities of the different Medicare claim review contractors that CMS uses to help reduce improper payments and protect the...more
Most providers whose claims have been determined to be improper by the Recovery Audit Contractors (RACs) under the Medicare Recovery Audit Program have discovered that the appeals backlog “is incontrovertibly grotesque.”...more
On February 9, 2016 the Obama administration released its proposed fiscal year (FY) 2017 budget. The budget, which would top $4 trillion, allocates nearly $1 trillion to CMS. This is an increase of $26 billion from the FY...more
On February 9, 2016, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reversed a district court’s dismissal for lack of jurisdiction in the American Hospital Association v. Burwell case. ...more
While providers would certainly feel the pinch from the FY 2017 budget request submitted by President Barack Obama, hospitals have some new hope on receiving funds tied up in the Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) appeals...more
Last week, the American Hospital Association (AHA) and several hospitals were successful in convincing the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to overturn a 2014 lower court decision, possibly paving the way for a...more
On December 22, 2015, CMS issued a Request for Information (RFI) detailing plans to expand its Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) program to cover Medicare Advantage organizations. ...more
On December 8, 2015, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and ranking member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) introduced the Audit & Appeals Fairness, Integrity, and Reforms in Medicare (AFIRM) Act of 2015 (S. 2368). ...more