CMS releases final rule on OPPS/ASC rates

Editor's Note

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on November 1 released a final rule that revises the hospital outpatient prospective payment system (OPPS) and ambulatory surgical center (ASC) payment system for CY 2017.

According to the rule, hospital off-campus facilities will no longer be paid the same as hospital-based outpatient departments if they started billing Medicare after November 2, 2015, the November 1 Modern Healthcare reports.

The rule updates hospital OPPS rates by 1.65% and ambulatory surgery center rates by 1.9% in 2017, compared with 2016.

CMS will accept comments for 60 days on the rule.

In a final rule that changes the way off-campus facilities are reimbursed, the CMS was flexible in grandfathering some hospitals that had to relocate their buildings because of natural disasters.