In November, 2012, Louisiana health officials declined to create a state-run exchange, leaving it to the federal government to operate a marketplace for Louisiana residents. Only recently has any real clarity on the structure of the Louisiana Health Insurance Exchange been available for its October 1, 2013 opening date. Continue reading
On Thursday, August 29, in response to the Supreme Court overturning a key portion of the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA), a handful of agencies announced they would be extending rights to married same-sex couples. Notably, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is one of them. This development means an extension of Medicare benefits to couples previously denied Medicare benefits because of DOMA. Same-sex married couples will be allowed to file joint federal tax returns, and as a result are able to claim marriage-related exemptions, employee benefits, claiming the earned income tax credit and other credits and deductions even if they live in jurisdictions that don’t recognize same-sex marriage. Continue reading
The Office of Inspector General issued a favorable advisory opinion on August 21, 2013 (Advisory Opinion No. 13-11) regarding two proposed arrangements involving the provision of emergency medical services for a township. In the first proposed arrangement, a basic life support ambulance supplier would not bill bona fide township residents for applicable emergency ambulance cost-sharing amounts, and would instead accept payment from the township for any cost-sharing amounts. Under second proposed arrangement, the basic life support supplier would waive otherwise applicable cost-sharing amounts when providing backup emergency ambulance services to certain patients pursuant to mutual aid partnerships with towns in the surrounding area.
The OIG concluded that the proposed arrangements would not constitute grounds for the imposition of civil monetary penalties under section 1128A(a)(5) of the Act, and although they could potentially generate prohibited remuneration under the Federal Anti-kickback statute, the OIG would not impose administrative sanctions under sections 1128(b)(7) or 1128A(a)(7) of the Act.
A copy of this advisory opinion is available on the OIG’s web site at: http://oig.hhs.gov/fraud/docs/advisoryopinions/2013/AdvOpn13-11.pdf.
Written by: Clay Countryman
The Office of Inspector General (OIG) issued a report on August 15, 2013 in which the OIG concluded that two-thirds or 856 of the Medicare enrolled Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) did not meet the location and distance requirements for a hospital to be enrolled with Medicare as a CAH. Hospitals can be certified as CAHs if they meet various regulatory requirements, including being located at least a certain driving distance from other hospitals and being located in rural areas. Medicare reimburses CAHs at 101 percent of their reasonable cost.
The OIG also commented that if CMS had decertified CAHs that were 15 or fewer miles from their nearest hospitals in 2011, the Medicare program would have saved $449 million. The OIG recommended that CMS take several actions to ensure a hospital’s compliance with the CAH requirements, including that CMS periodically reassess CAHs for compliance with all location-related requirements.
A copy of the OIG this report, “Most Critical Access Hospitals Would Not Meet the Location Requirements if Required to Re-enroll in Medicare” is posted on the OIG website at http://OIG.hhs.gov/ under the “What’s New” tab.
Written by: Clay Countryman
New York insurer Affinity Health Plan will pay $1.2 million to resolve allegations it breached HIPAA by returning leased photocopiers without deleting all information from the hard drives of the copiers that contained protected data involving 345,000 patients, federal regulators said on Wednesday, August 14. Affinity reported the breach as required by the breach notification rules in the HITECH Act of 2009 and Omnibus Rule released this year.
Affinity learned of the breach from reporters at CBS Evening news, who purchased one of the copiers and discovered ePHI on the hard drives. This is another harsh reminder that copy machines are a frequent source of unsecured PHI that is not generally scrubbed by the health care provider.
Affinity entered into a Corrective Action Plan that addressed their failure to provide physical safeguards outlined in the Security Rule, lack of a proper risk analysis to determine potential vulnerabilities, as well as insufficient policies and procedures applicable to the issue. “This settlement illustrates an important reminder about equipment designed to retain electronic information: Make sure that all personal information is wiped from hardware before it’s recycled, thrown away or sent back to a leasing agent,” said Leon Rodriguez, director of HHS’s Office for Civil Rights.
Written by: Stephen Angelette
bswhealthlaw.com 