The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced temporary regulatory waivers and new rules for hospitals and ASCs to respond to COVID-19.

Physician-Owned Hospitals
“Physician-owned hospitals can temporarily increase the number of their licensed beds, operating rooms, and procedure rooms. For example, a physician-owned hospital may temporarily convert observation beds to inpatient beds to accommodate patient surge during the public health emergency.”

ASCs
“CMS will allow communities to take advantage of local ambulatory surgery centers that have canceled elective surgeries, per federal recommendations. Surgery centers can contract with local healthcare systems to provide hospital services, or they can enroll and bill as hospitals during the emergency declaration as long as they are not inconsistent with their State’s Emergency Preparedness or Pandemic Plan. The new flexibilities will also leverage these types of sites to decant services typically provided by hospitals such as cancer procedures, trauma surgeries and other essential surgeries.”

Click here to view the press release.

Click here for additional background.

Click here to view the rules and waivers.