Brookwood Baptist Medical Center Medicare Certification Extended

Brookwood Baptist Medical Center, the second largest hospital in the metro Birmingham area, received an 11th-hour reprieve Thursday night with regulators from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services accepted the facility’s action, thus allowing the hospital to continue its Medicare and Medicaid billing privileges. However, the facility is not out hot water just yet.

“The immediate jeopardies have been removed at this time, but the hospital remains in noncompliance status and must work to correct the deficiencies cited to protect the health and safety of the facility’s patients,” according to a CMS statement, which also noted the survey review process can be extended over the next 60 days.

Brookwood Baptist CEO Keith Parrott said the hospital will continue to fully participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs without further interruption. Even a short-term interruption in participation could pose a significant financial challenge given the large amount of revenue and jobs at stake. Parrott also said the hospital will be resurveyed in the future.

In May, Brookwood Baptist received a notice stemming from an April incident in its psychiatric unit. The May CMS order was rescinded after a follow-up inspection determined Brookwood Baptist was in compliance with guidelines. Brookwood Baptist received a termination notice in late July that gave the hospital until Aug. 9 to become compliant with CMS guidelines pertaining to government body, patients’ rights and nursing services.

It was the second notice the hospital has received this year.

According to CMS, Brookwood’s immediate jeopardy notice was based on “the hospital’s failure to staff to implement its elopement policy resulting in the death of one patient; failure of staff in the telemetry monitoring unit to notify registered nurses of a patient who had no heart rate for 15 minutes and subsequently died; and a failure of staff to notify the physician of a patient’s low blood pressure readings resulting in the patient being found unresponsive and not breathing.