CMS is surveying stakeholders, including beneficiaries, HME providers with contracts, and discharge planners, to monitor the program in real-time. The American Association for Homecare released a statement calling the request a “rare opportunity” and encouraging providers to take advantage of it.
Providers must submit comments via email to [email protected] using the subject line “Competitive Bidding Surveys” for CMS to consider their feedback. Again, comments are due Dec. 20.
For its part, AAHomecare shared some key points from its comments to CMS, and welcomed providers to include these recommendations in their comments:
- CMS should issue the same surveys in advance of the implementation of the Round 2021 competitive bidding program to develop a baseline against which CMS can compare survey results from during the competitive bidding program.
- CMS should survey the stakeholders twice a year to better monitor trends and changes from competitive bid program impacts.
- Once surveys reveal particular negative impacts, CMS needs to conduct a root cause analysis and develop a corrective action plan that is shared with the industry in the spirit of transparency.
- CMS should publicize survey results, and the results should be available within a reasonable timeframe.
To help beneficiaries, caregivers, contract suppliers, case managers and NIV patients, AAHomecare also uploaded Word documents of sample questions those particular stakeholders can include in their comments to CMS:
- Supplier Survey Sample Questions
- Case Manager Survey Sample Questions
- Beneficiary Survey Sample Questions
- NIV Survey Questions (baseline)
- NIV Survey Questions (post Round 2021 implementation)
For more details on CMS’s request, read the agency’s announcement.
