Comparative Billing Report on Home Health Services

The Comparative Billing Report is provided as a collaborative effort between the Medicare provider community and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to support best billing practices and effective management of Medicare Program Resources.  The report has several pitfalls.  The first is the report is not wage index adjusted; therefore home health agencies with higher wage indexes can be inappropriately targeted.  The second is the report is not risk based adjusted for patient ages, comorbidities, agency size or referral sources.

The report is based on paid claims with service dates from 1/1/2011 to 12/31/2011.  The report compares the home health agency averages to the state and the national averages for following items:

1.     The average number of home health visits per beneficiary

2.     The average number of PT visits per beneficiary

3.     The average number of OT visits per beneficiary

4.     The average number of SP visits per beneficiary

5.     The average Medicare payments per beneficiary

According to several national home health associations only about half of the home health agencies actually received the reports.   We would encourage every home health agency that has received a report to carefully review the data to determine their standings compared to their state and national averages.  We can be certain that reviewers and surveyors will utilize this data.

For more information please utilize the following link.

http://www.safeguard-servicesllc.com/cbr/documents/CBR022%20Home%20Health%20Services%20Sample.pdf