Small home healthcare agencies sunk as much as $200,000 before CMS banned their businesses

According to Modern Healthcare, Brad Reiner spent two years and more than $200,000 to get a home health agency up and running in the southern Florida community of Vero Beach.

He applied for Medicare reimbursement, knowing that many private insurers would soon follow what’s considered the gold standard coverage.

But last month, all hopes for his new business truly flourishing came to an end after the CMS announced his business and a handful of other small business owners would not receive Medicare payment.

“You think you do everything right, you get approved you have a business set up and then this happens,” said Reiner.

The CMS has extended for six months and expanded statewide its ban on new home health agencies in Florida, Illinois, Michigan and Texas. The agency extended the ban, in place since 2013, because some providers were enrolling in counties outside a moratorium and then signing up patients who lived in the banned areas.

Reiner and others who were not involved in this activity say because they were far along in establishing their new agencies and had invested in property, staffing, accreditation and application costs, the CMS should grant them billing privileges.

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Modern Healthcare – Small home healthcare agencies sunk as much as $200,000 before CMS banned their businesses