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CMS ceases payments for hospitals' mistakes

Credentialing & Verification Update, September 12, 2007

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will stop paying hospitals for the costs of errors that could have been prevented, according to an August 18 article on www.yahoo.com.

The purpose of the change is twofold: to improve the accuracy of Medicare's payment for hospital patients who receive acute care and to encourage hospitals to improve the quality of their services, the article reports.

Herb Kuhn, acting deputy commissioner of CMS, is quoted in a CMS statement as saying, "Medicare payments for inpatient services will be more accurate and better reflect the severity of the patient's condition," according to the article.

The article cites the following eight conditions, three of which are considered "serious types of preventable incidents," that Medicare no longer will cover, the article reports:

• Objects left in a patient during surgery
• Blood incompatibility
• Air embolism
• Falls
• Mediastinitis (i.e., a type of post-heart surgery infection)
• Urinary tract infections from catheter use
• Pressure ulcers/bed sores
• Vascular infections from catheter use

Read the full article (for a limited time) at: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070818/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/medicare_hospital_errors;_ylt=AklsjBqUpkSfA9kDhx3Lo5RZ24cA.

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