The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has issued a notice that reminds hospitals experiencing an extraordinary circumstance beyond their control — which affects their performance or their ability to submit data — may continue to request an exception to reporting required quality data.
CMS will evaluate and grant exception requests on a case-by-case basis. The notice also reiterates how CMS has applied the COVID-19 measure suppression policy it adopted last year. The suppression policy allows CMS to exclude measures and data time frames the agency believes have been adversely affected by the pandemic in calculating hospital performance.