A report released late Friday by New Jersey’s health commissioner, Mary O’Dowd, recommends that the state require that all hospitals, public and private, for-profit and non-profit, publish their quarterly unaudited financial statements on their websites within 45 days of each quarter’s end, and their annual audits within 180 days of the close of a hospital’s fiscal year.

Physicians attempting to log in to the Open Payments website to verify information reported about them ahead of that information being made public are encountering a cumbersome log-in process and confusing error messages, reports ProPublica.

Noting that by their estimates, billions in disputed claims are tied up in the current appeals process for denied Medicare claims and this is causing severe harm to hospitals, the American Hospital Association along with the hospital operators Baxter Regional Medical Center, Covenant Health, and Rutland Regional Medical Center, have asked a Washington, D.C., court to issue a summary judgment in their favor and compel the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to honor the law’s requirement that disputed claims be heard by an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) within 90 days.

A final rule regarding the new ICD-10 implementation date is coming from the Centers for Medicare & Medicd Services but new guidance indicates the need for dual coding.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) used the proposed 2015 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) to create some carrots and sticks to encourage moving the care of more patients, particularly the growing percentage of beneficiaries with multiple chronic illnesses, into the lower-cost outpatient primary care setting.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has proposed a 2.1 percent market basket update for services paid under the hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (OPPS) in 2015 and to update Ambulatory Surgery Center (ASC) payments by 1.2 percent next year.

Leaders from the Senate Finance Committee and House Ways and Means Committee have introduced the Improving Medicare Post-Acute Care Transformation Act of 2014 (IMPACT Act), which would set quality standards and mandatory reporting deadlines for post-acute care provided by long-term care hospitals, inpatient rehabilitation facilities, skilled nursing facilities and home health agencies.

The majority of healthcare organizations are prepared to begin ICD-10 testing in the near future, however concerns persist about the impact of ICD-10 on work, productivity and revenue, according to a joint survey from the eHealth Initiative and the American Health Information Management Association.