On January 24, 2026, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released a yearly report on Medicare Fee-for-Service Supplemental Improper Payment Data. The data found that both skilled nursing facilities (SNF) and hospice providers were flagged as improper payment drivers.

SNFs had an overall improper payment of 15% with about $4.5 billion in improper payments, typically due to insufficient documentation. For hospices, roughly 6% of payments were improper totaling about $2 billion in improper payments with unsupported medical necessity driving the root cause analysis. Home health agencies totaled slightly less improper billing coming in with $1.1 billions in improper payments mostly due to insufficient documentation. Unsurprisingly, for home health and hospice improper payments, California had the highest improper payment rate at 12%.

With the administration's heightened scrutiny on fraud, waste, and abuse providers should ensure they are following doubling down on documentation expectations.