The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has frozen SNF Quality Reporting Program data on the Nursing Home Compare site through 2022.
In October, CMS released an updated tip sheet on the SNF QRP program that detailed the agency’s strategy regarding data submissions during the COVID-19 public health emergency. In a March memo, CMS made it optional for SNFs to submit QRP data for the 2019 fourth quarter, while providers were expected to submit data for the first and second quarters of 2020.
It will now hold the 2020 data constant. The site will remain frozen through October 2021. Public reporting will resume in January 2022 and a normal refresh will happen in April 2022.
While the suspension of the release of data may seem like a reprieve for skilled nursing operators, that is not necessarily the case, according to one expert.
“The impact of the freeze is that if your measures are not favorable, they will remain until the refresh in January 2022,” Amy Stewart, vice president of education and certification strategy at the American Association of Post-Acute Care Nursing, told McKnight’s.
She added that the “important message here is that the work the facility is doing today will impact future publicly reported measures.”
From the November 2020 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News
