Resources

Client Alerts, News Articles, Blog Posts, & Multimedia

Everything you need to know about BMD and the industry.

New State Budget Institutes Licensure Requirement for Ohio’s Hospitals

July 14, 2021

On July 1, 2021, Governor Mike DeWine signed Ohio’s final budget codified at Ohio Revised Code 3722.01 et seq., which includes a new licensing requirement for Ohio’s hospitals.

For years, Ohio was the only state in the country that did not license its hospitals. This approach will now be replaced with new, detailed requirements that will require careful review and compliance. Here are some of the highlights concerning these new changes:

When will a license be required?

All hospitals operating in the state of Ohio will be required to be licensed with the Ohio Director of Health within three years of the effective date of the new budget.  “Hospital” is defined by the Act as any institution or facility that provides inpatient medical or surgical services for a continuous period longer than 24 hours.

Some facilities will be exempt from the new licensing requirement, including hospitals operated by the federal government, nursing homes, and facilities used exclusively for hospice patients.

How do you receive a license?

License applications will begin to be considered by the Director after the Act has been effective for one year. The following will be required to be eligible for a license:

  • A completed application submitted with the accompanying fee;
  • Title XVIII certification under the “Social Security Act” or accreditation from a national accrediting organization approved by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services; and
  • A detailed breakdown of the number of beds available in the hospital.

An issued license will be valid for three years unless it is revoked or suspended, and a license can be renewed for additional periods of three years upon expiration.

What new policies will necessitate hospital compliance?

Upon issuance of a license, further steps must be taken by the institution to maintain compliance. First, the hospital must have a governing board that is tasked with overseeing the hospital’s management and control. Second, the hospital will be required to comply with rules adopted by the Director establishing health, safety, welfare, and quality standards for licensed hospitals. These rules are required to be provided to hospitals within one year of the effective date of the budget.

The new regulations also carry steep civil penalties for hospitals that fail to comply with their terms. The Director of Health may levy a $250,000 civil penalty against the hospital and fine the institution an additional $1,000 to $10,000 for every day the hospital operates without a license. If a hospital fails to comply with any of the Director’s rules, a civil penalty between $1,000 and $250,000 may be levied. The Director may also petition for injunctive relief in the proper Court of Common Pleas if an imminent threat of harm exists at a licensed hospital; a granted injunction can only be lifted after a showing that the harmful condition identified has been removed.

To learn more about these new, detailed regulations and to discuss any required changes to your current policies and procedures, please contact BMD Government Affairs Member and Lobbyist Victoria L. Ferrise (vlferrise@bmdllc.com – (330) 374-5184).

Client Alert

New York, Kansas, Massachusetts, and Delaware Become the latest States to Adopt Full Practice Authority for Nurse Practitioners

May 19, 2022While the COVID-19 pandemic certainly created many obstacles and hardships, it also created many opportunities to try doing things differently. This can be seen in the instant rise of remote work opportunities, telehealth visits, and virtual meetings. Many States took the challenges of the pandemic and turned them into an opportunity to adjust the regulations governing licensed professionals, including for advanced practice registered nurses (APRNs).Client Alert

Explosive Growth in Pot of Gold Opportunity for Bank (and Other) Cannabis Lenders Driving Erosion of the Barriers

May 13, 2022Our original article on bank lending to the cannabis industry anticipated that the convergence of interest between banks and the cannabis industry would draw more and larger banks to the industry. Banks were awash in liquidity with limited deployment options, while bankable cannabis businesses had rapidly growing needs for more and lower cost credit. Since then, the pot of gold opportunity for banks to lend into the cannabis industry has grown exponentially due to a combination of market constraints on equity causing a dramatic shift to debt and the ever-increasing capital needs of one of the country’s fastest growing industries. At the same time, hurdles to entry of new banks are being systematically cleared as the yellow brick road to the cannabis industry’s access to the financial markets is being paved, brick by brick, by the progressively increasing number and size of banks that are now entering the market.Client Alert

2021 EEOC Charge Statistics: Retaliation & Impact of Remote Work

May 11, 2022The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) released its detailed information on workplace discrimination charges it received in 2021. Unsurprisingly, for the second year in a row, the total number of charges decreased as COVID-19 either shut down workplaces or disconnected employees from each other. In 2021, the agency received a total of approximately 61,000 workplace discrimination charges - the fewest in 25 years by a wide margin. For reference, the agency received over 67,000 charges in 2020, and averaged almost 90,000 charges per year over the previous 10 years.Client Alert

Ohio’s Managed Care Overhaul Delayed – New Implementation Timeline

May 4, 2022At the direction of Governor Mike DeWine, the Ohio Department of Medicaid (ODM) launched the Medicaid Managed Care Procurement process in 2019. ODM’s stated vision for the procurement was to focus on people and not just the business of managed care. This is the first structural change to Ohio’s managed care system since the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' (CMS) approval of Ohio’s Medicaid program in 2005. Initially, all of the new managed care programs were supposed to be implemented starting on July 1, 2022. However, ODM Director Maureen Corcoran recently confirmed that this date will be pushed back for several managed care-related programs.Client Alert

Laboratory Specimen Collection Arrangements with Contract Hospitals - OIG Advisory Opinion 22-09

May 3, 2022On April 28, 2022, the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) published an Advisory Opinion[1] in which it evaluated a proposed arrangement where a network of clinical laboratories (the “Requestor”) would compensate hospitals (each a “Contract Hospital”) for specimen collection, processing, and handling services (“Collection Services”) for laboratory tests furnished by the Requestor (the “Proposed Arrangement”). The OIG concluded that the Proposed Arrangement would generate prohibited remuneration under the federal Anti-Kickback Statute (“AKS”) if the requisite intent were present. This is due to both the possibility that the proposed per-patient-encounter fee would be used to induce or reward referrals to Requestor and the associated risk of improperly steering patients to Requestor.
Older posts