Five tips to help providers comply with Stark

The Stark Law creates a whole set of antikickback rules that providers must understand and actively work to comply with. And with all its good intentions, the Stark Law is incredibly restrictive. In fact, even the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit noted that “even for the well-intentioned healthcare provider, the Stark law has become a booby trap rigged with strict liability and potentially ruinous exposure.”

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) and Congress have taken steps to clear up confusion and loosen the rules in some cases (See our article on exceptions for value-based care). Still, your Compliance team has a tremendous responsibility to make sure that policies match the rules and that providers understand and follow the policies.

Policies match the Stark rules

Changes to the Stark Law have been coming out practically since the law was enacted. The law, which aims to protect against kickbacks and self-referrals, has gotten complicated in the details. Congress issues amendments to help  the law catch up to changing business practices. Healthcare organizations may have written policies that facilitated compliance originally. However, those may be completely out-of-date if they weren’t keeping up with the changes in the law.

For example, CMS has introduced modifications that addressed challenges with value-based care and resolve issues restricting coordinated care and health data exchange. Another modification to the law was allowing healthcare providers to accept cybersecurity tech donations from stakeholders.

While the compliance officer enforces the policies, he or she doesn’t have to live them the way those in operations do. Getting input from key stakeholders such as providers, Risk Management, and others in the C-suite can help ensure that final policies are clear. This early feedback and engagement can also help identify how the policy or regulatory changes will affect the individuals who must operate under them. Lastly, they can help identify potential operational conflicts with new policies or regulatory changes.

(See how YouCompli delivers model policies and procedures that help your organization comply.)

Providers following the Stark policies

With compliant policies in place, it’s time to help providers understand how to follow them. This is where communicating what certain key terms in a policy or regulation means in the context of the provider’s particular work becomes critically important.

Compliance officers know that “the road to success is going to run through quality of care,” says Harry Nelson, health care attorney at Nelson Hardiman. “Compliance isn’t the internal police that slows things down, but a strategic part of growth.” When it comes to making sure providers understand how to follow policies, the compliance officer has to look at the language of the policy from the providers’ perspective, not that of the compliance officer.

Here are five steps to help providers understand and follow Stark-compliant policies:

  1. Engage your operational leaders. Make sure the president and CEO understand the nature and intent behind Stark limitations so they can help explain and reinforce them. Give situational examples they can relate to so they understand what the key terminology means.
  2. Invest in training and communication. One email won’t do it with changes to Stark-related policies. Engage providers in small groups, in writing, and in person to explain nuances and answer questions about tricky scenarios. Whenever possible, use real-world scenarios to help illustrate how the regulations and policies impact them. Education and training should also be routine and ongoing with key stakeholders.
  3. Get feedback. Regularly check in to gather feedback from your leaders. Find out if the implemented tools and procedures are working for them, as well as to identify challenges they face. This step will help you see areas where the  words on paper mean something the compliance officer had not thought of. Adapt procedures and tools if necessary.
  4. Encourage people to ask questions. Make sure providers and your operational leaders alike know they can use you as a sounding board for grey areas or possible violations. It’s much better if they proactively ask if a proposed arrangement is compliant. Otherwise, they may have to unwind a relationship if they find out it is not compliant.
  5. Promote awareness to prevent future mistakes. Once an error is made, chances are it will reoccur and lead to additional violations. As you are addressing errors, promote awareness to prevent future mistakes. For example, when you are communicating the fact that a mistake was made, go the extra step to what caused it. This will be an opportunity to find out where their confusion was and use that insight to update policies or training.

Stark compliance starts with knowing about changes to the regulations and continues with crafting policies that providers can understand and follow. Involving stakeholders in policy creation and training, and engaging tech systems to reinforce the lessons will support the long-term success of Stark-compliant policies.

Do you have the tools you need to recognize and manage regulatory change across your organization? Find out how YouCompli can help you manage and coordinate your response to regulatory change or schedule a demo.

Subscribe for blog updates

Stark Law: Flexibility for value-based care

The well-intentioned but complex Stark Law has gotten some updates recently. The changes give healthcare providers greater flexibility, especially with value-based care. 

The Stark Law was introduced in 1989 by United States Congressman Pete Stark (D-CA). It aims to protect Medicare and Medicaid from paying for services that may trigger conflict-of-interest concerns. This includes certain healthcare services for which physicians referred their Medicare/Medicaid patients to an organization with which they have a financial relationship. Referrals like this trigger questions about whether the patient really needed the service and raises concerns of physicians referring for their own financial benefit.  

Take, for example, a physician who refers a Medicare/Medicaid patient for an x-ray to a medical imaging facility. The facility then bills Medicare for that service. This may seem appropriate unless the physician has a financial interest in the medical imaging facility.  

The law faced criticism, however, for being too rigid. According to Henry Casale, partner at Horty Springer, “providers have found that the Stark Law is deceptively simple to summarize, but compliance has proven to be difficult and complex.” 

Casale went on to say that “Stark said that ‘the only way to protect healthcare consumers from unnecessary referrals is to impose a bright line rule.’ The Stark Law prohibits a physician from making referrals for certain Designated Health Services (DHS) payable by Medicare or Medicaid to an entity with which the physician (or an immediate family member) has a direct or indirect financial relationship (ownership or compensation). It also prohibits the entity from filing claims with Medicare or Medicaid for those referred DHS, unless the financial relationship complies with an exception to the Stark Law.”  

New value-based exceptions 

New exceptions under Stark allow for physicians to refer Medicare/Medicaid patients to entities they have a financial relationship with and that are part of a value-based program, in some cases. Additionally, the physician may receive remuneration, such as cost savings payments, so long as the requirements of the new exception are met.  

According to Casale, “The Stark value-based rules cover both cash and in-kind remuneration and do not include the term ‘Fair Market Value’.”  These rules have a number of requirements, but those requirements decrease as the value-based physician participants assume more financial risk.  The greatest flexibility is when the physician participants agree to assume full financial risk. (This includes capitation and global budget payment arrangements.) The requirements increase if the physician participants assume only “meaningful” financial risk. (The physician is responsible to repay or forego no less than 10 percent of the total value of the remuneration the physician receives under the value-based arrangement.) The requirements are greatest where the physicians are not at financial risk. 

“The Stark value-based rules are a significant improvement,” Casale said. “But they do leave a number of questions unanswered.” They also differ markedly from the OIG’s value-based safe harbor regulations that were published the same day, especially where the physicians are not at financial risk.  Here the OIG only provides safe harbor protection for in-kind remuneration while the Stark rules permit both cash and in-kind remuneration.  

“So while the Stark rules provide guidance and significant flexibility,” Casale said, “providers need to also consider the OIG’s much more narrow view of value-based arrangements.”   

Related: Discover how CMS is improving patient care while reducing administrative burden for providers. 

Rules related to Stark and anti-kickback legislation have been evolving for decades. These recent changes reflect an effort to add greater flexibility with value-based care and help keep the law responsive to current business practices in healthcare.  

How is your healthcare system adapting to keep up with changes to rules from the Stark Law and other fluid regulations?  Read more about how YouCompli can help you stay on top of regulatory changes or schedule a demo. 

Jerry Shafran

Jerry Shafran is the founder and CEO of YouCompli. He is a serial entrepreneur who builds on a solid foundation of information technology and network solutions. Jerry has founded, managed, and sold software and content solutions that simplify complex work. His innovations enable professionals to focus on their core business priorities.

Subscribe to receive updates from YouCompli