Thursday, December 30, 2010
Busy, Busy, Busy...
The Rehab Optima teams are busy completing CMS-driven end of year updates, e.g., Physician Fee Schedules, CCI Edits, additions to Part B Cap Management and updating the therapy cap amount to $1870...Rehab Optima has you prepared for 2011!
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
The Season of Giving, Preparation and Patience!
The waiting is over, or, should we say, almost over…President Obama has signed the Medicare and Medicaid Extenders Act of 2010! While you know this law extended the therapy cap exceptions process and the physician fee schedule ‘doc fix’ through December of next year, restored the October 1st RUG-IV implementation date (Yay! No hybrid system!) and addressed several other key Medicare payment issues, you may not have known that the industry continues to await final, key decisions regarding the MPPR. No need for concern, as Rehab Optima developers are patiently standing by, anxious to implement functionality that will address processing the payment reductions when different therapy disciplines file the same code on the same day, once clarification from CMS is provided.
In the meantime, GiftRAP will continue to monitor CMS and FI/MAC websites for announcements related to LCD changes. With the change in status of the 95992 code, we anticipate more change, and patiently wait! Of course, Rehab Optima will deliver these "gifts" just as soon after announcements are made!
In the meantime, GiftRAP will continue to monitor CMS and FI/MAC websites for announcements related to LCD changes. With the change in status of the 95992 code, we anticipate more change, and patiently wait! Of course, Rehab Optima will deliver these "gifts" just as soon after announcements are made!
Thursday, July 22, 2010
CMS Reschedules SNF PPS Training
The Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) Prospective Payment System (PPS) Resource Utilization Group-Version 4 (RUG-IV) Conference Call that was scheduled to take place on Wednesday, August 04, 2010 at 1:30 p.m. Eastern Time, has been cancelled.
The call has been rescheduled to Tuesday, August 24, 2010 at 1:30 p.m. Eastern Time.
IMPORTANT: If you previously registered for this call, you do NOT need to register again.
The call has been rescheduled to Tuesday, August 24, 2010 at 1:30 p.m. Eastern Time.
IMPORTANT: If you previously registered for this call, you do NOT need to register again.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
MDS 3.0: Training Opportunities
October 1st is right around the corner - the day MDS 3.0 is implemented. While this brings vast amounts of revision to processes and business operations in Long Term Care, it is possible to successfully navigate through this ocean of change! You are not alone in your attempts to plan and prepare for the revisions. Avoid the sinking ship by empowering yourself with knowledge and the necessary tools to successfully and seamlessly transition by joining others embarking in these educational opportunities:
- July 22nd - 2:00 p.m. est Rehab Optima 4.0 Preview Webinar: Click to Register
- July 22nd - 2:00 p.m. est CMS LTC Open Door Forum: Click to Register
- July 27th - 2:00 p.m. est PCC Sponsored/GiftRAP Partnered Webinar: Importance of Capturing Restorative Nursing and Therapy in MDS 3.0: Click to Register
- August 3rd - 2:00 p.m. est PCC Sponsored/GiftRAP Partnered Webinar: Impact of RUGs-IV on LTC Providers: Click to Register
- August 4th - 1:30 p.m. est CMS Sponsored: SNF PPS Resource Utilization Group - Version 4 (RUG - IV): Click to Register
- August 11th - 2:00 p.m. est Rehab Optima 4.0 End-User Functionality Webinar: Click to Register
- August 12th - 2:00 p.m. est Rehab Optima 4.0 System Administration Webinar: Click to Register
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Changing "How" GiftRAP Develops Software
I came to GiftRAP in June 1998, right as PPS and mandatory submission of the MDS were making their debut. At the time, there were only three of us at GiftRAP, and we did everything including requirements gathering, development, testing, software deployments, tech support and sales. With all of these hats to wear, we had to be efficient and agile.
Suddenly, in the mid 2000s, we rapidly added customers, revenue and employees. Slowly but surely, our agile beginnings were replaced by rigid processes and lots of documentation that nobody would ever want to read.
Then, one day last year, we took stock of where we were, and we realized we had become bogged down in "big up-front design". We were spending so much time "designing" that we didn't have time to actually implement. When implementation was complete, it wasn't uncommon to find that either the end-user expectations had changed or our product managers missed the mark.
We were "eventually" delivering valuable functionality to our end-users, but it was just taking way too long. Something had to change!
We had to get closer to the way we did things in the "old days" when Steve Mackie and I sat down next to our one and only developer and collaborated on the best approach to address our customer needs.
We started exploring new ways of developing software that would return us to our agile roots that enabled us to create great software that would "wow" our customers and prospects.
It didn't take long before we recognized the development methodology called "Scrum" as the perfect fit. Incidentally, Scrum has become the most popular agile development methodology in recent years, so it is well established and respected in the software development community.
In January, we made the jump from a typical "Waterfall" methodology to "Scrum" which prescribes great planning, "just in time" design decisions and heavy collaboration between developers, product owners and end-users (customers).
Rather than long release cycles of 3 to 6 months associated with Waterfall, Scrum prescribes development iterations referred to as Sprints ranging in length from 1 to 4 weeks. We generally run 2-Week Sprints here at GiftRAP.
The cool thing about Scrum and the prescribed Sprints is that each successful 2-Week Sprint produces one or more pieces of "potentially" shippable functionality that are valuable to our end-users. Our Scrum Team Members, consisting of developers and testers, present a 30-Minute demonstration of the functionality they completed and tested at the conclusion of each Sprint. This gives our teams the reward of showing off what they did during the last two weeks, and it gives our Product Owners (customer representatives) the opportunity to inspect and "accept" the new functionality as "complete". To be accepted, the functionality must be fully implemented and tested by the Scrum Team. They are not even allowed to demonstrate functionality that has not met these criteria.
With 6 months of Scrum under our belt, I can say that the change has been a tremendous success for GiftRAP. The benefits have been abundant:
- Faster development of features
- Significantly higher quality
- Increased visibility for our senior management and customers
- Increased predictability as to when features will be "done"
- Better features being produced
While we have witnessed all of these benefits at GiftRAP, they haven't been visible to our customers "yet". This will change soon with the release of ROX 4.0 in September. Although we have produced valuable functionality in recent months, deployments have had to be withheld until MDS 3.0 changes are completed. Following the release of ROX 4.0, we have the opportunity to deliver valuable functionality in short periods of time that we know will "wow" our end-users. That's exciting!
Suddenly, in the mid 2000s, we rapidly added customers, revenue and employees. Slowly but surely, our agile beginnings were replaced by rigid processes and lots of documentation that nobody would ever want to read.
Then, one day last year, we took stock of where we were, and we realized we had become bogged down in "big up-front design". We were spending so much time "designing" that we didn't have time to actually implement. When implementation was complete, it wasn't uncommon to find that either the end-user expectations had changed or our product managers missed the mark.
We were "eventually" delivering valuable functionality to our end-users, but it was just taking way too long. Something had to change!
We had to get closer to the way we did things in the "old days" when Steve Mackie and I sat down next to our one and only developer and collaborated on the best approach to address our customer needs.
We started exploring new ways of developing software that would return us to our agile roots that enabled us to create great software that would "wow" our customers and prospects.
It didn't take long before we recognized the development methodology called "Scrum" as the perfect fit. Incidentally, Scrum has become the most popular agile development methodology in recent years, so it is well established and respected in the software development community.
In January, we made the jump from a typical "Waterfall" methodology to "Scrum" which prescribes great planning, "just in time" design decisions and heavy collaboration between developers, product owners and end-users (customers).
Rather than long release cycles of 3 to 6 months associated with Waterfall, Scrum prescribes development iterations referred to as Sprints ranging in length from 1 to 4 weeks. We generally run 2-Week Sprints here at GiftRAP.
The cool thing about Scrum and the prescribed Sprints is that each successful 2-Week Sprint produces one or more pieces of "potentially" shippable functionality that are valuable to our end-users. Our Scrum Team Members, consisting of developers and testers, present a 30-Minute demonstration of the functionality they completed and tested at the conclusion of each Sprint. This gives our teams the reward of showing off what they did during the last two weeks, and it gives our Product Owners (customer representatives) the opportunity to inspect and "accept" the new functionality as "complete". To be accepted, the functionality must be fully implemented and tested by the Scrum Team. They are not even allowed to demonstrate functionality that has not met these criteria.
With 6 months of Scrum under our belt, I can say that the change has been a tremendous success for GiftRAP. The benefits have been abundant:
- Faster development of features
- Significantly higher quality
- Increased visibility for our senior management and customers
- Increased predictability as to when features will be "done"
- Better features being produced
While we have witnessed all of these benefits at GiftRAP, they haven't been visible to our customers "yet". This will change soon with the release of ROX 4.0 in September. Although we have produced valuable functionality in recent months, deployments have had to be withheld until MDS 3.0 changes are completed. Following the release of ROX 4.0, we have the opportunity to deliver valuable functionality in short periods of time that we know will "wow" our end-users. That's exciting!
Monday, July 5, 2010
Our New Blog
We've been considering starting a blog at GiftRAP for quite some time. As new challenges face the long-term care and rehab industries, our customers and prospects often want to know what our thoughts are and what we are doing to ensure Rehab Optima meets the challenge. We are very excited about the opportunity that our blog will give us to communicate quickly to everyone.
We will also use our blog to talk about what we are working on at GiftRAP to make Rehab Optima even better and to discuss new ideas that we have come across that our customers might benefit from. We hope you find the contents of our blog to be of value in the months and years ahead!
We will also use our blog to talk about what we are working on at GiftRAP to make Rehab Optima even better and to discuss new ideas that we have come across that our customers might benefit from. We hope you find the contents of our blog to be of value in the months and years ahead!
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