U.S. Rehab Recap and Plan for 2020 and Beyond

Published in Complex Rehab on May 13, 2020

In these very trying times during the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. Rehab is working diligently to keep our members updated on the changes that are happening in D.C. with CMS and how this is affecting our membership community. We have worked diligently alongside many industry leaders, including NCART, NRRTs, the ITEM Coalition, and many manufacturers and providers to ensure the success of our industry.

We want to take this time to update you on our progress with some of our programs and keep you informed on other new opportunities that you may not be aware of that can benefit your business tremendously.

Member’s Only

You may or may not already be aware that VGM & Associates and U.S. Rehab have updated our websites to maximize user experience—both on the forward facing website, as well as the back end where our members can browse our vendor’s promotions, peruse our document library, and see the upcoming events that U.S. Rehab is involved in. Please take time to register yourself and your team for our site and opt in to receive our emails at the Member Login: vgm.com/communities/us-rehab/.

DMERT

2019 saw lots of progress in the DMERT Group’s Level 1 and Level 2 courses to educate your service technicians and to set new standards in the industry for the knowledge base that a technician should have in mobility and complex rehab, along with providing an official certification approved by the University of Pittsburgh. The program is all online, and now is a great time to step back and educate your team on the equipment that they’re servicing on a daily basis.

New Vendor Partner

U.S. Rehab and Ability Products recently solidified a partnership to provide exclusive pricing and discounts to our membership. Ability Products is the exclusive ROLKO dealer of wheelchair parts, accessories, and seating products for North America. Their high-quality parts and accessories at a great price point for our membership community is sure to be a great addition to your vendor portfolio. Be sure to take a look at their catalog at abilityproducts.net.

FMA

With the help of our dedicated members, our 7000th piece of Time 1 data came through on our Functional Mobility Assessment. The collection of this data, as well as the analysis, is continuing on through the pandemic. The results that we are seeing are outstanding. The ATP’s employed within our membership are doing an unbelievable job. They are reducing hospital readmittance, preventing pressure sores, and minimizing falls—which are all saving a large sum of money to “the system.” We appreciate those that are supplying us with the data, and we look forward to continuing the collection of the data and working hand in hand with the University of Pittsburgh on the analysis

COVID-19 Updates

We will continue to field questions from our members and keep you updated on the latest information that we have on programs available, funding, and changes in policy as we progress through this pandemic. Our goal is to help every one of our members thrive through this virus and to continue serving for many years to come. You can find all of the latest information at vgm.com/coronavirus/.

Medicare has suspended all audits, except the OIG will not be suspending their audits of PMD repairs. Suppliers are able to request a 30-day extension if they would like. Within these audits, the technician’s work ticket, along with what the repairs were and an itemized labor time per part, are required. This must be documented within 12 months preceding the date of the repair, and the order is not sufficient for continued need. If you have additional questions about this process, please feel free to reach out to Dan Fedor at dan.fedor@vgm.com.