Final hospice rule sets 3.8% increase for FY2023

Hospices will see slightly higher reimbursement than expected in fiscal year 2023 under a payment update set out by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) in this week’s final rule.

The hospice payment update percentage is 3.8% (an estimated increase of $825 million in payments from FY 2022). The final rule sets the hospice cap amount for FY 2023 at $32,486.92.

These numbers are higher than the 2.7 percent increase CMS had earlier proposed. The hospice cap amount set out in the proposed rule on March 30 was $32,142.65.

In addition to the pay increase, the final rule:

Places a permanent 5 percent cap on negative wage index changes
Updates the Hospice Quality Reporting Program (HQRP)
Offers an update on the Hospice Outcomes and Patient Evaluation (HOPE) patient assessment instrument now in the testing stage of development. Future quality measures within the HQRP are expected to be based on HOPE.
Provides details about a web-based experiment for the CAHPS Hospice Survey.

View the final rule here.