In 2017, the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) began allowing older Medicare set aside arrangements (MSAs) for workers’ compensation to be reviewed and approved a second time. Prior to the introduction of this process, known as “a…
Effective management of the costs associated with liability and workers’ compensation claims in the U.S. must include assuring compliance with the requirements of Medicare. It’s a tricky system to navigate and a bit of a moving target, but our team o…
Staying in the know about what’s happening with Medicare is critical, as the changes to regulations can have an impact on workers’ compensation for payers. Recently, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released Version 3.0 of the WCMSA…
Vivid memories of desperate nursing home residents in wheelchairs submerged waist-high in flood waters will forever be etched in our minds, especially during hurricane season. The shocking photos and tragic heat-related deaths of numerous skilled nur…
In my spare time, I enjoy reading and learning about the strangeness of the subatomic world. Quantum theory is difficult to understand and really hard to believe because it is counterintuitive and contrary to what we witness in reality. Quantum physi…
Over the past several months there have been direct communications from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) that liability Medicare set-aside arrangements (LMSAs) were on the horizon. In this blog we commented on a February announcemen…
CMS now permits some old MSAs to be re-approved Before this week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) had a simple philosophy: Parties get one bite at the apple when it comes to CMS approval. However, on Monday, CMS released an upda…
For the past several years, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has been providing the industry with vague hints about liability Medicare set-aside arrangements (LMSAs). The absence of clarity left the liability community unable to…
Last week I posted that CMS appeared to have altered the zero dollar MSA approval process. This caused a great deal of discussion and activity. This has resulted in CMS releasing the following bulletin indicating that no changes …
What if I told you that you could save $185,000 at no cost to you? No, I am not advertising for some late night TV infomercial where the offer is too good to be true. I am talking about the world of Medicare set-asides (MSA). It is well known that pr…
If you have been trying to keep up with the latest Medicare compliance changes, you might feel like you are watching the carnival vendor who used to say, “around and around it goes and where it stops nobody knows.” Fortunately, with these answers y…
Speculation is rife about what will happen with healthcare in 2014. Now one of the first predictors has publicly voiced its opinion. On Wednesday, I read with great interest that Moody's revised its outlook for the U.S. healthcare sector to negativ…