|
|
|
|
|
2011 April 29th: The website is almost ready and should be up and running. Sorry for not keeping the Medicare Mentor updated, but the seminars and also continuation of health issues delayed everything. Hopefully I will get back to normal (well almost) soon. March 30th: This has not been a good month. Sorry for the delay in updates and Medicare Mentor articles, but health issue have taken quite a bit of my time. I decided that reason we retire at 65 is to have time to go to all those doctor visits and physical therapy sessions. <grin> I finally succumbed and went to see a doctor about my wrist and back. For many years I have lived by the mottos, "don't do as I do, do as I say" and "the therapist that treats themselves has a fool for a therapist" Anyhow, having had therapy and feeling much better, I am back to work and looking forward to our new presentations in Los Angeles this weekend. We have had a wonderful response and I am looking forward to doing these 2 programs in other areas. Our website update is a little behind schedule but the mock-ups look good. I am really looking forward to rolling it out soon. February 3rd: We have FINALLY published our 2011 seminars. We have 2 seminars applicable to Part B services as well as our SNF seminar. We have returned to our roots for our SNF seminars returning to the 2 day format. we also have a 1 day test and measures program which, although it focuses on PT, is applicable to both SNF and Part B. We have expanded our Part B seminar and have included more practical examples and increased attendee participation. Presently we have our initial locations but will be expanding our locations in the next week. We are looking for host sites so if you are interested, please contact us. January 24th: Our Medicare Mentor column is becoming a success with our followers. Thank you. We finally got a recording of our Medicare Made Easy for SNF program. It's available on CD and you can order extra handouts to make it a department project. Just go to our online store. Finally, we are getting our seminar schedule ready and should have it published by the end of the week. We are really excited as we have hosting for our new Part B programs in Los Angeles on April 1st and second. Both programs are new. Anatomy of Documentation is an update of our Part B seminar and "Tests, Measures and Questionnaires, making them work for you" is a brand new program completely devoted to objective testing and enhancing your evaluation and assessments. This program is suitable for both Part B and SNF providers. Although predominantly for PTs, it can be of interest and use to OTs as well. Also good news, is that we have been approved by the California PT Board to be an approval agency. So, if you are in California, and are looking for Board approval, we can help. Not to mention that we are now able to provide CEU approved course ourselves. We are looking for sites to host our workshops and seminars for 2011. This helps us keep the cost of the programs down and also helps our host site, it's a win-win situation. If you have facilities that can accommodate our attendees, consider this option, especially if you are in one of our listed location.
2010 December 23rd: We have our new Q&A page up and running! Our new page is called "Medicare Mentor" and is applicable to all therapies. As most of you that are PTs or PTAs, I have been writing the Medicare Advisor column for the Advance for PT News magazine for over 10 years. You may have noticed that recently, the column is not being updated as frequently as it used to be. Because of this, we are now planning on providing a similar format on the Encompass Website. The page will be updated with information specifically for Part A SNF on a Monday and for Part B Services on a Friday. For those of you in SNF, we also will be updating the MDS 3.0 Fact or Fiction page with questions specifically related to the new rules. We welcome comments on the postings or questions to be answered. You can send comments or questions to MedicareMentor@encompassmedicare.com
December 13th: Ola from Brazil. That means "Hello From Brazil". This is where I am on vacation (supposed to be on vacation). I have updated our website to contain a page called MDS 3.0 Fact or Fiction. This page will be your reference for information on the MDS 3.0 and RUG IV system. The topics will be added as I receive questions from either attendees of my seminars or questions through the info@encompassmedicare.com web page. Confusion reigns both in the provider setting and in CMS itself. Bookmark this page or visit us frequently as it will be posted on the home page when updates are added. December 1st: Wow, didn't know it had been so long in updating this page. I guess the fact that we were so busy is good news. Anyhow, here's where we are. As of December 8th, the Encompass Office will be closed as I am going on a "well earned", at least I think so, vacation. I will still be in contact via e-mail and the web. I will be still working somewhat, finalizing our schedules for 2011 and working on the web based courses. We are modifying both programs for 2011, going back to the 2 day program for SNF and expanding the Medicare Part B to 7.5 hours and shifting the focus to documentation to survive Medical Review. For those of you unable to attend any of our courses in 2010, we will be making audio version available at the beginning of January. We get an awful lot of questions on Medicare both by e-mail and telephone. This is good except it doesn't bring me in any money and takes a lot of my time. I would love to be a charity, but unfortunately, that would not help me pay my bills. So here is what we are going to do. We will be having a new page that will publish these questions and answers, a little bit like the Medicare Advisor column in Advance. My goal is to update those Q&A at least weekly, but more often if possible. This project will be a "vacation" job so expect that to be published in the New Year. Also look for new products. We have updated the SNF Survival Guide for MDS 3.0 and will also have a "cheat sheet" to help SNF Rehab Directors and MDS Coordinators figure out the best CMI (Case Mix Index for RUGs) for reimbursement. Got any other ideas? Let us know. August 15th: Based on feedback from our RUG$ to Riche$ program and Medicare Made Easy, we have updated the Made Easy for SNF to include only Part A information relating to the provision of therapy under the MDS 3.0 and RUGs IV. We have expanded the MDS section, included a section for comparison of nurses documentation to therapy and have included more documentation examples for Part A services. In doing this we have now made a Medicare Part B Made Easy to include only Part B services BUT are concentrating on the documentation of skilled services which is applicable to Part A as well as Part B. We have eliminated the duplication in both programs so that both days will apply to the SNF setting without significant repetition. Look at our new brochure for Medicare Made Easy.
July 26th: RUG$ to Riche$ ends its scheduled course! We finished out our limited edition of this program in Ohio last week. This program has been the most difficult of all of the presentations we have done. Starting with the delay of the normally scheduled interim Final Rule, to the almost daily updates and changes to the MDS 3.0 and training, it will be absolutely amazing if anyone will be ready for the October 1st deadline including CMS. We will be updating you all as usual through our What's News page, along with frequent tweets for those of you signed up for them on Twitter and other work tools including Webinars and CD training materials. So keep coming back.
July 7th: Don't get caught up in the rumors that are out there concerning the MDS 3.0. There are rumors going around that Medicare is only going to allow individual and group, but no concurrent - NOT TRUE. CMS is requiring groups to be done - NOT TRUE. Most of these rumors are being put out by companies that contract services to SNFs and part of it is the way they get paid by the facilities. If paid by the RUG and not by time, then they will make more money by including group into their plans as a regular event, 30 minutes or group for 4 patients provides 4 sets of patient reimbursement for 30 minutes of time, better than 2 patients at concurrent levels. I'm not saying that all contract companies are doing this, but this is where most of these "new regulations" are coming from. We will keep you updated as CMS publishes the regulations (by the end of the month at the latest) and also when any more changes are made to the RAI manual. Sign up and follow us on Twitter, our goal is to keep you informed of events and changes as they happen so you can make the determination of how YOU should be practicing. June 23rd: We've moved into the 21st Century. Encompass now has Twitter as well as Facebook. Keep in touch with changes in Medicare through our Twitter link and what we are doing and updates to our Educational programs through Facebook. I have just finished presenting both our Medicare Made Easy and RUG$ to Riche$ workshop in Connecticut for All Star Therapy, a company providing Contract Services for SNFs as well as Outpatient Services from their own clinics. We still have places in all of our upcoming workshops. October 1st will soon be here, along with BIG changes as to how we provide therapy services to the Part A beneficiary. May 24th: We have just finished our first round of RUG$ to Riche$ in Florida and have received great reviews from our attendees. Although not sure of the RUG IV categories being implemented, we started our attendees of with strategies to implement NOW to prepare for the changes in calculation of the RUG levels through the newly, clearly defined concurrent therapy as well as looking at other ways to increase their revenue. We will be in Illinois in June and Ohio in July. We also have two companies that will be sponsoring the presentation in Connecticut and New Jersey. Not in your State? Would you like to sponsor the program? Let us know. May 12th: We now have our own Facebook page. visit us and see what some of our friends "like". Been to our seminars? Let others know what you think.
March 20th: This has been a busy time but we have lots of exciting news, well, we think it is. We finally have our 2010 seminar locations and dates or Medicare Made Easy for SNFs and Part B. We are also planning a very limited presentation of "RUGs to Riches" Strategies for October 1st. This program will cover what you can start to do to get prepared for the implementation of RUGs IV and MDS 3.0. We will have the brochure ready by the middle of the week. If you see your location on our list for any of our seminars and you have the facilities to hold the program or wish to be a sponsor let us know. We have several different kind of opportunities for sponsorship. We will also be started to provide live webinars in the coming months. We will cover a variety of topics. IF you have any suggestions of topics you think would be of interest let us know. We also wish to welcome Jodi Hall to our company. Jodi is a SLP with lots of experience in all setting, but especially Long Term Care. Jodi will be a great asset to us on ensuring that we can cover Speech services more effectively. She also will be providing some of our educational services. So keep our website bookmarked for an exciting 2010.
January 22nd: Where is time going???? We have finally got the brochure for our new programs finished and on the website. We have scheduled some seminars for March, April and May and will be deciding on other locations and dates soon. If you have location suggestions or have facilities that we can use, let us know. The January e-zine will be going out in the next few days and we will also have it available through the website. We are working on some changes to its content and look which we intend to make it a more valuable addition to the Encompass services. 2009 December 25th: Wow, shows just how busy we were. We have had a lot of e-mail asking about our schedule for 2010. This is our plan. We are taking our 2 day Medicare Made Easy for SNF and consolidating it down into a one day presentation that is focusing on the nitty gritty of succeeding in SNF Part A and Part B. We have eliminated a lot of the historical information and have expanded the workbook to be a permanent resource for the regulations that the therapists work under. We will be posting the Seminar information on the website by the end of the first week in January. We have also now taken the second day of the 2009 Made Easy program and have made it specific to the Part B provider. Included in this seminar will be the rules and regulations concerning the provision of Part B services by all provider settings, along with how to document to ensure reimbursement and a successful Medical Review. Farther into the year we will be providing a SNF seminar for both therapy and nursing on how to document to support skilled services. This will be provided by both a nurse and therapist, so stay tuned. We are expanding some of the resources available to therapists and will be working on producing user friendly programs covering the MACs Local Coverage Determinations (LCDs) that will become an integral part of any clinics compliance program. We are looking forward to 2010 and have many other exciting projects on the drawing board. Remember to bookmark our website to keep upto date with this coming years changes. Encompass and its staff wish all of you a Healthy and Successful 2010 July 9th: We have experienced a wonderful response to the seminars we are presenting for Summit Professional Education and are now able to provide you with a direct link to our seminar and its locations. We will be presenting the one day program during the fall in the North East, then following the Fall colors moving south to Virginia, North and South Carolina, West Virginia and Kentucky. The end of October and the early part of November will find me in Texas. We will continually update the information to reflect the changes occurring with the Medicare program and the implementation of the RAC Medical Reviews, in fact, JUST what we do with our Medicare Made Easy series. Follow this link to find our more about the Summit seminars, let them know we sent you. http://www.summit-education.com/seminars1.php?i=6642 May 30th: Our next series of Medicare Made Easy will be available as a one or two day program. Day One will be available for those wanting mainly Part A SNF information, such as DONs and MDS Coordinators and Day Two will be of great interest to both SNF and Part B providers as we address documentation issues. We have had great attendance at the Summit Seminars so far. We will be in the New York and Boston Area this coming June, then in Michigan in July. April 15th: Well, this has been a very busy month so far. The series of 1 day seminars for Summit have been quite a success although I feel as if I should be singing "I've been everywhere, man."! Danna Mullins is returning as a speaker and will be presenting some of our "Medicare Made Easy" seminars in the second half of this year. We will also be looking into adding some management courses. March 14th: Summit Professional Education has added the following location to "Optimizing Reimbursement for Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapy Services". To make reservations contact them at www.summit-education.com/seminars and select the state. Let them know Encompass recommended the course. The new dates and locations are: February 17th: We have had to change the dates of our Columbus and Chicago Seminars due to scheduling conflicts. We have just reversed the date, Chicago will be Thursday and Friday, April 30th & May 1st, Columbus will be May 4th & 5th. February 11th: Our Medicare Made Easy seminars started in Florida with several firsts for us. We had two therapists come join us from Puerto Rico, two PTs who are starting their own private practice companies and two Administrators from New Jersey without their therapists. We also had two hearty soles who attended the Super Bowl (paint and all) and then drove down to Ft Lauderdale, arriving at 4:30 for our class which started at 8:00. High test drinks kept them alert and focus, and talkative. The second day of our seminar focuses on Part B and documentation. It's a perfect 1 day seminar for anyone providing Part B services. IF this may interest you, we are accepting therapists for day 2 only, space available. We are excited to announced that we have finalized a relationship with Summit Professional Education to do a series of one day seminars on Medicare. This seminar provides a good overview of the Medicare program and will be of interest for therapists in all provider sites. The course is called "Optimizing Reimbursement for Physical, Occupational and Speech Therapy Services". The first seminars will role out in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Summit schedules locations about 6 to 8 weeks in advance, so I don't yet know if I will be coming to a place near you. I will post the locations as I have them so you can keep up to date. This will be a great Medicare 101 for new to Medicare therapists as well as a "bringing up to date" for those who have been in the field for some time. CMS has changed, make sure you do as well! The link to Summit is www.summit-education.com/seminars If you sign up for a course, let them know that Encompass recommended them. We are presently scheduled for Pennsylvania March 9 /10/ 11: New Jersey March 18 / 19 / 20: Alabama March 25 / 26: Atlanta March 27: Tennessee April 6 / 7: and Little Rock April 8. You need to identify the State to access the information. We will keep you posted of locations as they are determined. Happy New Year! Well, Encompass had a very good year in 2008 thanks to all of you that attended our seminars, used our consulting services and joined our CQR membership. We are hoping to make 2009 even better. WE have some exciting news to tell you in a few days about a new venture we will be getting into. So keep visiting our site and we will keep you informed.
|
||
