What’s the point of all of our treatment interventions and plans of care if we can’t relate to our patients? If you can put a face and personality behind your justification for therapy services,...
New career path?
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Dec 03, 2013
How many of you will agree with me that we never fully turn off the internal therapist mode when we’re in public, outside of work hours?
A home-for-the-holidays checklist for therapy patients
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Nov 19, 2013
Well, it’s that time of year already. Hectic schedules, extra weekend shifts and holiday planning. It’s also time for rehab to spend some extra time discussing holiday plans with their patients....
Jimmo and the future of rehab
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Nov 07, 2013
On Jan. 24 of this year, the Jimmo vs. Sebelius class action lawsuit was settled. This was a significant win for us, the healthcare providers. As we continue to work out the details, I feel now is a good...
GTB. AYS?
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Oct 22, 2013
Can anyone guess what the title to this blog is stating? In the current culture of text messaging and abbreviations for everything, it can be a danger zone for medical documentation. Unfortunately, I have...
No more Rehab Medium RUG defaults
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Oct 08, 2013
Well, Oct. 1 has passed, and we’re all still hanging in. The biggest changes we saw to rehab were the addition of reporting co-treatment minutes on our billing logs and Section O on the MDS. And,...
Ready or not: The MDS is changing again!
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Sep 25, 2013
On Oct. 1, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will be updating the Minimum Data Set with another round of changes. Most are minor but there will be two changes to the therapy section. Your case-mix...
What’s on Your PEPPER Report?
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Sep 10, 2013
Have you received your provider-specific PEPPER report yet? The Program for Evaluating Payment Patterns Electronic Report (PEPPER) were mailed on August 30 and have been slowly arriving at skilled nursing...
Are you prepared? 5 questions you need to know the answers to
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Aug 27, 2013
With all the recent regulatory changes that have come down the line, or are about to, we developed a simple five-question survey that each provider had to ask every therapy employee. If you can develop...
What is therapy? It’s not as simple as it might seem
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Aug 13, 2013
“What is therapy?” sounds like a simple question, but it requires a separate and very complex answer for each discipline.