The Gov. Juan F. Luis Hospital is not in any imminent risk of losing Medicare reimbursements, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
"We are not talking about termination at this point," said Jeffrey Hall, regional director of media communications for CMS, Thursday afternoon. “We are just talking about a plan of correction.”
He said CMS has been in the business a long time and that it was “very, very rare” to suspend payments on new admissions to hospitals. “We do everything possible to make sure these facilities stay in business," Hall said.
The hospital was up against a Jan. 31 deadline to submit a plan of correction for problem areas at the hospital, but CMS has extended the deadline until Feb. 15. "This is not a termination notice," Hall said. “This is an extension for the corrective action plan for participation in Medicare. Termination is not on the horizon at this point.”
Following a 2011 CMS inspection, JFL Hospital was found deficient in 11 of 23 categories. In December 2011 the hospital entered into an improvement agreement with CMS. The hospital’s most recent plan of correction was rejected as insufficient.
On Wednesday the hospital’s newly named interim chief executive officer, Dr. Kendall Griffith, met with staff and told them CMS had not agreed to extend the deadline for compliance.
Without CMS certification, Juan F. Luis Hospital could not bill the federal government for services to Medicare and Medicaid recipients, which would be devastating to its already precarious financial situation.
But as Hall clarified Thursday, CMS is not currently considering termination of reimbursements. CMS is working with the hospital to formulate and implement a plan of correction, and has extended the deadline for the hospital to submit that plan.
