Medicare pay for skilled nursing visits?

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How much do home care agencies get paid by medicare for RN visits? I noticed on the medicare website that for 2009 skilled nursing visits were listed as $109 and for 1010 as $111. Is this just a base rate and increases as patient complexity/increase in skilled nursing care is needed or is it a flat rate? Thanks in advance for your response:)

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Specializes in Psych.

I would love to hear the answer to this also.

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Specializes in Functional Medicine, Holistic Nutrition.

If you are talking about Medicare-certified home health agencies, it is a lot more complicated than that. There is a home health prospective payment system (PPS). Medicare pays home health agencies a predetermined base rate with adjustments for the acuity level of the patient, service needs, and geographic location. Payment is made for an entire episode of home care services (60 day periods) with agencies receiving half of the total payment when Medicare gets the claim and the other half when the episode ends. The payment is not per visit.

So, I'm not sure what is posted on the Medicare website- this may be a national average when it is broken down. However, the payments are bundled for all of the home health services- SN, HHA, PT, OT, SLP, and MSW. It is much more complicated than just a per visit rate. Hope this helps!

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