CMS Considering Overhaul of Hospital Wage Index
Nov. 27—The Trump administration is mulling changes to the Medicare hospital wage index system, including the creation of a commuting-based wage index, according to federal officials.
Defining Finance and Operating Leases Under the New Lease Accounting Standard
The FASB’s Accounting Standards Update (ASU) 2016-02 – Leases (Topic 842) describes how to determine whether a lease should be classified as an operating or a finance lease.
Bottom-Line Implications of New Lease Accounting Standards: What Healthcare Leaders Should Know
Healthcare organizations should be prepared for a lease accounting standard, effective in 2019, that changes the way they are required to report leases on their balance sheets.
Tipping the Scale: A Methodological Approach to Revenue Analysis
When acquiring a medical group, health systems should eschew blunt profit and loss statements in favor of more precise approaches, using market metrics to assess each site or specialty.
Impacts Expected from 2019 Transparency Requirements
Nov. 16—Healthcare executives expect widely divergent impacts from the unprecedented transparency on charges that hospitals are required to implement within six weeks.
Ask the Experts: Up-Front Reserves
What is the industrywide uncollectable percentage for accounts receivable that hospitals can set aside as up-front reserves?
Acquiring Physician Practices: Key Strategic Considerations for a Successful Transaction
Health systems seeking to acquire physician practices should first develop a thoughtful physician acquisition strategy that considers factors such as whether the focus will be on primary care physicians or specialists and the extent to which the strategy is offensive or defensive.
Selecting the Right Costing Model
By using cost data at appropriate levels of accuracy and detail to support decision making, hospital finance leaders can minimize the risk of incorrect decisions caused by insufficiently precise data.
Sample Footnote for a Cost Accounting Report
This is an example of the type of footnote an organization might provide in its cost accounting report and is intended to serve as a template for such a footnote. It originally accompanied the article “Selecting the Right Costing Model,” by Paul Selivanoff, CPA (November 2018 hfm).
Ask the Experts: Reagent Agreements
How do you record reagent agreements for which the vendor locks in the price on various reagents if the hospital commits to a minimum purchase quantity each year?