{"id":11176,"date":"2016-08-17T20:17:44","date_gmt":"2016-08-17T20:17:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.medicareadvocacy.org\/?p=11176"},"modified":"2021-08-10T16:56:28","modified_gmt":"2021-08-10T20:56:28","slug":"cms-increases-mandatory-enforcement-to-protect-nursing-home-residents","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medicareadvocacy.org\/cms-increases-mandatory-enforcement-to-protect-nursing-home-residents\/","title":{"rendered":"CMS Increases Mandatory Enforcement to Protect Nursing Home Residents"},"content":{"rendered":"

Under the federal Nursing Home Reform Law, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has authority and the “responsibility”[1]<\/a> to impose Civil Money Penalties (CMPs) and other enforcement actions at nursing homes that are found to violate federal standards of care (which are called Requirements of Participation).[2]<\/a>  For the first time in more than 20 years – since <\/span>the federal enforcement regulations were published in 1994[3]<\/a> – CMS has increased the numbers and types of situations when CMPs must be imposed<\/strong> against facilities, without first giving the facilities an opportunity to correct their noncompliance.<\/p>\n

Effective for all nursing home surveys completed on or after September 1, 2016, CMS’s new national policy mandates, under additional specified circumstances, the immediate imposition of CMPs at nursing homes.[4]<\/a>  The new policy will be implemented through revisions to Chapter 7 of the State Operations Manual (SOM), Pub. 100-07.[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

The most striking changes are requirements that CMS impose immediate CMPs when a facility is cited with:<\/p>\n

(1) A harm-level deficiency (level G or above)[6]<\/a> in three specified areas:<\/p>\n