Q: During your last Medicare survey, what was an area of improvement that was brought to your attention?
Kathie Stewart: Our last Medicare survey was done in June. There was one minor thing the surveyors pointed out. CMS had released 167 pages of new rules on the conditions for coverage, and we just happened to miss the part about needing to provide a verbal explanation of those conditions for coverage. The verbal explanation of the conditions for coverage meant reading 21 points on the patients’ rights, including grievance procedures and non-discrimination policy.
Q: What new procedure was implemented in order to meet that new standard?
KS: The surveyors suggested that we add a voice mailbox that pre-records the conditions for coverage, which is an idea they had seen other facilities in the area adopt. What is done now is that the scheduler talks to patients over the phone before their procedure. After talking to them about demographic information, insurance information, some basic health history and other things, she tells them they are going to be transferred to a voice mailbox so they can listen to their patient bill of rights. The voice mailbox reads the 21 points for conditions for coverage, including their right to expect personnel to be patient and friendly, their right to be fully informed of the scope of services and to be involved in the decisions and so on.
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