The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has identified a subset of hospice residents who should have been excluded from the long-stay (LS) antipsychotic measure for the first quarter of 2026. These residents were inadvertently included because of incomplete hospice data in the CMS Centralized Data Repository.
The issue affected approximately 2% of residents included in the measure for the quarter. CMS does not anticipate that it will significantly affect facilities’ overall measure results or quality measure ratings.
CMS is updating its calculation to ensure that these residents are appropriately excluded going forward. The correction to first-quarter 2026 data will appear in the October 28, 2026, refresh of Nursing Home Care Compare.
Facilities that have questions or believe there may be an issue with their LS antipsychotic measure calculation should contact the SNF Quality Reporting Program Help Desk at
SNFQualityQuestions@cms.hhs.gov.