Skilled Nursing Facilities/Long-Term Care Open Door Forum

**Updated September 10, 2012 - CMS has made available two new recorded training sessions for IRFs on the QIES Technical Support Office (QTSO) website. The sessions are as follows:
1. IRF-PAI Assessment Submission Process – provides the necessary instructions for submitting IRF-PAI assessment data to the ASAP IRF-PAI Submission System beginning October 1, 2012.
2. CASPER Reports for IRFs – provides information about accessing and interpreting the ASAP system-generated IRF-PAI Facility Final Validation Report, identifies other reports available to IRFs and gives an overview of the basic functionality of the CASPER Reporting application.
• The recordings can be accessed via the e-University page on the QTSO website at https://www.qtso.com/webex/qiesclasses.php .
• Please contact the QTSO Help Desk at (800) 339-9313 or help@qtso.com if you have questions regarding this training session.
**Updated September 7, 2012 - Please join us for the first in a series of monthly conference calls for an update on Affordable Care Act (ACA) implementation efforts that impact doctors, nurses, hospitals and other providers of health care. The monthly “ACA Implementation Update for Providers” will review recent announcements from HHS and its agencies, explore one or two topics with senior HHS officials and provide an opportunity for you to ask questions and share feedback.
These update calls will be held on the second Thursday of the month at 2pm ET. The call is closed to the press – but all stakeholder and interested parties are welcome to attend. Our first call will be on September 13th at 2pm ET.
WHAT:                                Affordable Care Act Implementation Update for Clinicians, Hospitals and other Healthcare Providers
TOPIC:                                 Medicaid Expansion
DATE:                                   September 13th at 2pm ET
DIAL IN:                               1-888-455-2963 Passcode: 2954962
For those who are not able to join on the 13th at 2pm – a recording will be available after the call for 30 days by calling 800-570-8799 (no passcode needed).
The next ACA Implementation Update for Providers is currently scheduled for Oct 11th at 2pm ET.
**Updated September 5, 2012 - The slides for the Manual Medical Review of Therapy Claims Special Open Door Forum are now available in the Downloads section below. If you wish to participate, dial: 1-877-251-0301; Conference ID: 23782155.
**Updated August 31, 2012 - The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will hold a Special Open Door Forum on the Manual Medical Review of Therapy Claims on September 5, 2012, from 2:00pm-3:30pm, ET. If you wish to participate, dial: 1-877-251-0301; Conference ID: 23782155. Please see the Downloads section below for the announcement with full participation instructions.
**Updated August 30, 2012 - The Slides for the August 30, 2012 Special Open Door Forum for Long-Term Care Hospital Quality Reporting is now available in the Downloads section below. If you wish to participate, dial: 1-800-837-1935; Conference ID: 20497757.
**Updated August 28, 2012 - The Announcement/Agenda for the August 30, 2012 Special Open Door Forum for Long-Term Care Hospital Quality Reporting is now available in the Downloads section below. If you wish to participate, dial: 1-800-837-1935; Conference ID: 20497757.
**Updated March 30, 2012 - A new clarification memo has been posted to the SNF PPS website. This memo is intended to provide clarification of a number of questions that we have received on various SNF policies as well as introduce a new policy, effective April 1, 2012, for handling interviews on unscheduled PPS assessments. The memo may be accessed through the following link: http://www.cms.gov/SNFPPS/Downloads/SNF-Clarification-Memo-20120308.pdf.
**Updated March 14, 2012 - The Draft LTCH CARE Data Set Version 1.00.1 Specifications for October, 2012 are now posted. A Specification Change document identifying changes since Draft Version 1.00.0 is included in the .zip file. Final specifications will be posted in the near future. The specifications can be found on the CMS web page:
http://www.cms.gov/LTCH-Quality-Reporting/ . Specifically, please see the Downloads Section of that web page. The .zip file containing the updated "Draft" LTCH CARE Data Submission Specifications (v1.00.1) is located there.
See Submission Specifications (v1.00.1) The files within this .zip are:
 LTCH Data Submission Spec Changes (v1.00.1) 20120305.pdf
 LTCH 1.0 data specs overview (v1.00.1) DRAFT 20120305.pdf
 LTCH data dictionary (v1.00.1) DRAFT 20120305.zip
 LTCH data specs CSV files (v1.00.1) DRAFT 20120305.zip
 LTCH data specs HTML files (v1.00.1) DRAFT 20120305.zip
 LTCH data specs PDF files (v1.00.1) DRAFT 20120305.zip
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Skilled Nursing Facilities/Long Term Care Open Door Forum (ODF) Overview:
The Skilled Nursing Facilities / Long-Term Care Open Door Forum (ODF) addresses the concerns and issues of both the Medicare SNF, the Medicaid NF, and the nursing home industry generally. The types of issues that come up during this forum are often related to the Minimum Data Set, SNF Consolidated Billing, the roles and responsibilities of different SNF, NF or LTC professional staff under CMS regulations, clarifications of issues that are covered during a survey and certification process, and the many rules and requirements under which different related services can be payable. Timely announcements and clarifications regarding important rulemaking, quality program initiatives, and other related areas are also included in the forums.