Sheila Lambowitz

Hospitalizations contribute to cognitive decline, study finds

McKnight's Staff March 23, 2012

Seniors who have been hospitalized have a higher risk for experiencing a cognitive decline, a new study finds.

ONE DAY UNTIL ONLINE EXPO; Medicaid policy in flux

McKnight's Staff March 20, 2012

The federal government is readying for the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, but what that will mean for long-term care funding remains uncertain.

McKnight's Online Expo begins next week

McKnight's Staff March 16, 2012

More registrants than ever are prepping for the fifth annual McKnight's Online Expo, which kicks off Wednesday and Thursday at a keyboard near you.

CMS: Count on lower reimbursement levels, tougher scrutiny of provider billing practices

October 18, 2011

Providers at a special healthcare policy forum in Washington received a sobering evaluation Monday for why they were hit with an average 11.1% cut in Medicare reimbursement starting Oct. 1. A top long-term care official with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services systematically rejected common complaints and excuses regarding the $4 billion take-back by the federal government.

Administration explains possible huge nursing home pay-rate reduction

May 13, 2011

A possible Medicare payment rate reduction to skilled nursing facilities relates to higher-than-expected therapy classifications, federal officials explained Thursday.

CMS says repeal of RUG-IV delay still possible, to relax MDS transmission rules

October 29, 2010

Federal regulators said Thursday they are hoping that Congress will act by the end of the year to keep in place full-time what is now being called a provisional RUG-IV nursing home Medicare payment system. Still, preparations for an alternate system recently began in earnest, an official for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said Thursday during the agency's monthly SNF Open Door Forum conference call.

CMS to redo nursing home validation reports due to MDS 3.0 system glitch

October 19, 2010

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will have to reprocess validation reports for an estimated more than 100,000 records from nursing homes as a result of a glitch in the new MDS 3.0 system, Sheila Lambowitz, director of the Division of Institutional Post Acute Care at CMS, told McKnight's Monday.

The glitch

Liza Berger October 19, 2010

It's amazing what some lines of computer code can do. In the case of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, it threw off the workings of the new MDS 3.0 system.

CMS might need six months before starting to reprocess nursing home payment claims, agency says

June 04, 2010

It could take federal regulators six months or more to devise and implement a new payment scheme for nursing homes after a new resident assessment tool goes active Oct. 1, an official with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services said Thursday.

Implementation of RUG-IV payment plan in 2010 to be interim measure, CMS stresses

May 26, 2010

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will implement "interim" payments that reflect the MDS 3.0 and RUG-IV system this October only if Congress does not pass legislation repealing the delay of RUG-IV until 2011, the agency emphasized Tuesday.

Delay of RUGs-IV confuses calculation of nursing home reimbursement rates, regulators say

April 23, 2010

Federal health officials said Thursday that they still don't have a way to calculate proper Medicare nursing home reimbursement rates after mandated changes are to take place this fall with the introduction of MDS 3.0.