HomeCare Editors’ Top 5: Week of October 26

Medicare Advantage Ratings May Change
Top CMS officials signaled this week that the agency will consider altering Medicare Advantage quality ratings to adjust for socio-economic characteristics of a plan’s enrollees. (Virgil Dickenson/Modern Healthcare)

ICD-10 Guidance Gives Latitude to Home Health
Home health care agencies and other providers can make judgment calls in when to use certain ICD-10 codes that in most circumstances are not meant to appear together, according to interim guidance issued Monday by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). (Tim Mullaney/Home Health Care News)

Remaining Uninsured Worry About Cost of Coverage
Department of Health and Human Services officials Thursday predicted that about an additional 1 million Americans would sign up for coverage under the federal health law next year and acknowledged that prospective enrollees are worried about the cost of health insurance, even with the law’s financial help. (Mary Agnes Carey/Kaiser Health News)

Another Coding Deadline Looming
While it’s still too early for individual providers to truly gauge the impact of ICD-10 on their revenue cycles, just getting through October 1 must have been a great relief. Now, providers face mandatory quality reporting measures in early 2017. (Chris Nerney/Revenue Cycle Insights)

So Ready-Made Rx for Rising Drug Costs
When Turing Pharmaceuticals raised the price of an older generic drug by more than 5,000 percent last month, the move sparked a public outcry. How, critics wondered, could a firm charge $13.50 a pill for a treatment for a parasitic infection one day and $750 the next? (Julie Appleby/Kaiser Health News)