CMS team here to resurvey CHC

Eighteen days after confirming the Commonwealth Health Center’s corrective action plan, a three-member team from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services made a surprise visit to the hospital yesterday morning.

According to Commonwealth Healthcare Corp. hospital administrator Jess M. Tudela, the CMS team is here to resurvey the hospital.

CHCC chief executive officer Esther Muña, hinted in an earlier interview with Saipan Tribune, that she expects a CMS team to visit the hospital to see if the corrective plans have been addressed and to see what the hospital is working on.

Muna is off-island at this time; according to CHCC, she is on leave.

Tudela said that they did an entrance conference yesterday at 8:30am and CMS will do an exit conference on Friday afternoon. Three members of the current CMS resurvey team were part of the five that visited CHCC in the past, according to Tudela.

“So far the CMS surveying team came with a list of items that they wanted and we are currently giving it to them,” he said.

Several of the items that Tudela mentioned were the organizational chart, employees that include new hires, physicians, list of patients admitted, ancillary services, and services of medical staff.

Tudela said that CMS is doing the resurvey in line with the hospital’s application to have its Condition of Participation with the Medicare and Medicaid programs recertified.

CMS put off its decision on CHCC’s recertification in mid-January this year and again on June 27 due to lingering concerns. A letter to Muña dated June 25 gave CHCC another five months to correct issues previously cited by CMS.

In the June 25 letter to Muña, CMS gave CHCC more time to demonstrate capacity and commitment to achieve and sustain compliance with all Conditions of Participation, in consideration of the extent of the deficiencies, complexity of making fundamental, systemic changes, and in recognition of the importance of maintaining access to hospital services for CNMI residents.

The prospective date of termination of CHCC’s Medicare provider’s agreement was extended to Nov. 14, 2014.

“After they had accepted the plan of correction they are doing a follow up and will probably focus on the deficiencies,” Tudela said. “The CMS surveyed the clinic today [outpatients, family care clinic] and they were satisfied with the deficiency being addressed.”

CMS visited CHC in September last year and identified 13 deficiencies at the hospital. In January this year, CMS found that only four citations were considered satisfied and that nine other deficiencies remain unresolved.

In an earlier interview, Muña said that they have addressed these concerns but are still working on a few issues, one being the hospital’s infrastructure.