As part of the Trump administration’s plans to target fraud in Medicare and Medicaid programs, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on May 13 announced that rather than the standard enrollment process, hospice and home care providers won’t be able to apply to be in Medicare for six months. CMS classifies hospice and home health as “high-risk” areas for fraud, and pausing new enrollment will give the agency time to root out bad actors, the agency said in a press release. “During the six-month moratoria, CMS will intensify targeted investigations, deploy advanced data analytics, and accelerate the removal of hospice and [home health] providers from the Medicare program that are suspected of committing fraud,” the release reads. While individual states have previously issued similar moratoriums with varying lengths of time, nationwide bans are very uncommon, according to Nicole Liebau, resource center strategic partnership and engagement director at Senior Medicare Patrol, a government-funded program designed to prevent, detect, and report Medicare fraud and abuse. She said the pauses for hospice and home health—as well as a moratorium CMS issued earlier this year pausing Medicare enrollment from certain medical supply companies—are the only nationwide moratoriums she could find in CMS’s history. Not all industry leaders oppose the pause, though.—MA | 
