To be covered, home health services must be furnished in a beneficiary's home or an outpatient setting. For purposes of coverage of home health services, an outpatient setting may include a hospital, SNF, or rehabilitation center with which the HHA has an arrangement and that is used by the HHA to provide services that either require equipment that cannot be made available at the beneficiary's home or are furnished while the beneficiary is at the facility to receive services requiring the equipment described above. Time spent providing covered home health services to beneficiaries under a home health plan of care at hospitals, skilled nursing facilities or rehabilitation centers when they involve equipment too cumbersome to bring to the home should be reported in fifteen minute increments. An HHA staffer may have to spend time traveling to the location where care is given, or transporting a beneficiary to that location. As we have noted, rules relating to whether or not services are part of a covered visit have not changed.
Travel time continues to be recognized as a reasonable cost.
For purposes of the 15 minute increment reporting, travel time would not be included in counting 15 minute increments. The manner in which time is currently recorded on medical records will not be changed. These records may continue to show the start and end times of a visit.