Top therapy reimbursement for everyone: here’s how
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Jul 18, 2011
If the Ultra High is the highest level of allowable treatment we may seek, it’s our professional obligation to clinically provide these levels of service to every patient.
Are you prepared? 5 questions you need to know the answers to
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Aug 27, 2013
With all the recent regulatory changes that have come down the line, or are about to, we developed a simple five-question survey that each provider had to ask every therapy employee. If you can develop...
Phone therapy relieves seniors’ insomnia and pain, Kaiser study finds
By
Alicia Lasek
Feb 25, 2021
At 12 months, fully 56% of participants who received phone-delivered cognitive behavioral therapy were still in remission from insomnia, compared with 26% of the control group.
Dehydration: Therapy should help fight it
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Jul 15, 2014
The elderly are very vulnerable to dehydration and more than just the nursing staff have to be concerned about it. Not keeping an eye on appropriate hydration can cause a variety of serious problems.
No more Rehab Medium RUG defaults
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Oct 08, 2013
Well, Oct. 1 has passed, and we’re all still hanging in. The biggest changes we saw to rehab were the addition of reporting co-treatment minutes on our billing logs and Section O on the MDS. And,...
You’re probably guilty of too much documentation
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Jun 18, 2013
Is it time for a diet? Not a food diet, but a documentation diet. I’ve written previous blogs about documentation quick tips, top 10 reasons for denials, and so on. But, how many of you are guilty...
OIG? OMG! One lump problem
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Jan 23, 2013
The Office of the Inspector General’s recent report about what it calls $1.5 billion in inappropriate Medicare payments to skilled nursing facilities should be yet another wake-up call to providers.
Happy holidays: ’tis the season for more rehab work
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Dec 08, 2011
It’s that time of year again, the when our hospitals and nursing facilities start to fill up with patients suffering from new fractures, falls, pneumonia and other cardio-pulmonary diseases. However,...
Ready or not: The MDS is changing again!
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Sep 25, 2013
On Oct. 1, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will be updating the Minimum Data Set with another round of changes. Most are minor but there will be two changes to the therapy section. Your case-mix...
50 shades of G-coding
By
Shelly Mesure, MS, OTR/L
Jul 02, 2013
Sorry, ladies, I didn’t mean to get your hopes up with that title. But does anyone else feel like there is a lot of ambiguity to the new G-Coding system? Well, it’s a little too early to tell...