Click on a headline below for the full story.

CCH® Health Care Compliance Integrated Library
The Health Care Compliance Integrated Library delivers the latest information on health law. The Library includes seven invaluable titles:

• Civil False Claims and Qui Tam Actions - An essential tool for bringing or defending Qui Tam action.
• Clinical Research Compliance Manual: An Administrative Guide - Essential guidance on the laws and regulations affecting clinical research and trials.
• Defending and Preventing Health Care Fraud and Abuse Cases: An Attorney's Guide - Clear, expert guidance on protecting against charges of health care fraud and abuse.
• Health Care Fraud and Abuse Compliance Manual - Giving health care providers a clear perspective on fraud and abuse laws, written in plain-language.
• Health Law and Compliance Update - Find the latest information on emerging issues. Each section is authored by an expert in the area and includes in-depth analysis of the latest health law and compliance issues.
• Hospital Contracts Manual - Expert, current know-how in dealing with numerous hospital contract scenarios.
• Hospital Law Manual - Health Law expertise covering treatment and payment issues in the delivery of health care services.

For more details, contact your sales rep.

The HIPAA Compliance Handbook, written by Patricia I. Carter, is intended for HIPAA coordinators, project managers, privacy officers, compliance professionals, health care record managers, and others who have the responsibility for implementing the HIPAA Administrative Simplification title. It contains easy-to-understand explanations of the legal and regulatory provisions as well as sample HIPAA-related agreements. The 2008 Edition includes:

• Case law updates, including details of the Machado/Ferrer case, the first criminal case to go to trial under the Privacy Rule.
• Enforcement updates, including information about the Office for Civil Rights' new enforcement Web site, HHS delegation of subpoena power, and the first Security Rule audit by the Office of Inspector General.
• Information about the National Provider Identifier (NPI) contingency guidelines and the CMS plan for NPI data dissemination.
• Highlights of the first official guidelines on the Security Rule.
• New appendices with business associate language and a sample plan amendment.

Learn more. Subscribers only

Not a subscriber? Subscribe today.

As an organization grows and changes, having a continual assessment process for the organization's health care compliance program will ensure that the program remains effective, according to Lisa Eggleston, a CMS health insurance specialist who participated in an audioconference presented by the Health Care Compliance Association on November 29, 2007. Along with F. Lisa Murtha, Managing Director of Huron Consulting Group, Eggleston discussed the results of CMS' Compliance Effectiveness Study that began in late 2004. CCH Chicago Bureau, Nov. 29, 2007. Full Story

Medicaid payments disbursed to providers who are delinquent in their federal tax obligations do not qualify as "federal payments" that can be levied-on through the government's Federal Payment Levy Program (FPLP), said Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Acting Commissioner Linda Stiff during a November 14, 2007, hearing before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. The hearing was the "fifth in a series before the subcommittee on federal contractors who are paid with taxpayer dollars but fail to pay their taxes," subcommittee chairman Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) explained in a statement during the hearing. CCH Washington Bureau, Nov. 14, 2007. Full Story

The recently proposed Form 990 distorts public understanding and hurts organizations the public wishes to help and support, according to nonprofit industry representatives. During a November 15, 2007, telephone conference, Clara Miller, President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Nonprofit Finance Fund, and Robert Ottenhoff, President and CEO of Guidestar, discussed their recommendations for amending Form 990, and emphasized the need to design a form that presents a clearer picture of nonprofit organizations for the nonprofit donor community. In June, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) released a revised Form 990 for a public comment period that closed on September 14, 2007. CCH Washington Bureau, Nov. 15, 2007. Full Story

In its semiannual report to Congress in June, the HHS Office of Inspector General (OIG) revealed a sharp drop in the number of settlements related to the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act (EMTALA), and in the related civil monetary penalties (CMPs) collected. In the first six months of federal fiscal year (FY) 2007, the OIG reported collecting $80,000 in total CMPs from three hospitals under EMTALA settlements - one-fifth of the amount collected during the same six-month period in FY 2006, when the OIG collected $345,000 from 12 hospitals and one physician. Healthcare Registration, Vol. 16, No. 11, Aug. 2007. Full Story

CMS has outlined new quality measures for inclusion in the 2008 Physician Quality Reporting Initiative (PQRI), including structural measures that focus on whether physicians and health care professionals use electronic health records and e-prescribing technology. The 2008 PQRI measures were released in the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule Final rule, which was published in the Federal Register on November 27, 2007. Final rule, 72 FR 66221, Nov. 27, 2007; CMS Press Release, Nov. 1, 2007. Full Story

The hospital interpretive guidelines regarding infection control have been revised. Due to changing infectious disease threats, as well as new mechanisms to confront these threats, the guidelines have been updated to reflect current conditions within hospitals as well as contemporary infection control standards of practice. The revised guidelines discuss: (1) applicable requirements for the infection control condition of participation and related standards; (2) survey procedures to be used to determine compliance; and (3) practices that hospitals are encouraged to adopt. The revised guidelines are effective immediately. CMS Letter to State Survey Agencies, No. 08-04, Nov. 21, 2007, Health Care Compliance Reporter p350,065. Full Story

Application of the "stand in the shoes" provisions of the Stark II Phase III final rule (72 FR 51012, Sept. 5, 2007) to certain compensation arrangements has been delayed until December 4, 2008. The delay is only applicable to compensation arrangements between the following physician organizations and entities: (1) with respect to an academic medical center (AMC), as described in 42 C.F.R. 411.355(e)(2), compensation arrangements between a faculty practice plan and another component of the same AMC; and (2) with respect to an integrated tax-exempt health care system, compensation arrangements between an affiliated designated health service entity and an affiliated physician practice in the same integrated tax-exempt health care system. Final rule, 72 FR 64161, Nov. 15, 2007, Health Care Compliance Reporter p700,054. Full Story

Physiotherapy Associates, Inc., a Memphis, Tennessee based outpatient therapy provider and its former parent company, the Michigan based Stryker Corporation, have agreed to pay the United States $16.6 million to settle allegations that they submitted false claims to Medicare and other federally funded health care programs in violation of the Federal False Claims Act (FCA). DOJ Press Release, Nov. 14, 2007. Full Story

New safe harbor protects certain financial arrangements involving federally qualified health centers

by Michael A. Dowell, Esq., Contributing Editor

The safe harbor protection under the anti-kickback statute for certain financial arrangements involving FQHCs addresses donations, loans, and the furnishing of items, goods, and services to certain federally-funded health centers, including FQHCs and Indian health centers ("health centers"). The safe harbor protects arrangements in which entities and individuals (namely hospitals, specialty physicians, and other health care providers and suppliers) ("donors"), furnish these sorts of loans, services, and other items to health centers, if the arrangements meet certain safe harbor criteria. Full Story