As much of the Southeastern U.S. continues to recover from the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, health care providers should be aware of, and consider the extent upon which they rely upon, the flexibilities that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) extended to assist with the Public Health Emergencies (PHEs) in the affected states.

As a result of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, CMS extended additional resources to Medicare providers and certain health care facilities in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.

As background, during a PHE, the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) may temporarily waive certain HIPAA Privacy Rule requirements for hospitals.

During the recent PHE, HHS issued HIPAA-related waivers lasting up to seventy-two (72) hours to hospitals located in the declared emergency that had activated their disaster protocol, including waivers for: the distribution of HIPAA privacy notices; patient rights to request privacy restrictions and confidential communications; communications with family or friends involved in care; and, opting out of facility directories. Health Information Privacy PHE responses can be found here.

CMS provided additional waivers for affected health care providers, such as medical staff flexibility in an effort to address workforce shortages and reduce the burden of credentialing and privileging processes.

Examples of other CMS waivers issued for affected hospitals and health care facilities during the recent PHE, include:

• EMTALA Flexibility: to permit offsite patient screening outside the hospital’s campus
• Surge Capacity and Space Use: to permit the repurposing of non-patient areas for patient care, as long as the state approves and safety is ensured
• Telemedicine: to permit the provision of telemedicine services to patients through agreements with offsite hospitals to expand access to care; and,
• Temporary Expansion Locations: to permit the establishment of additional care locations that meet the required conditions, including existing provider-based departments, to expand capacity during emergencies.

These flexibilities will remain in place until the PHE has been rescinded. Additional information regarding waivers for each state and current emergency waivers can be found here.

The CMS waivers are aimed at increasing flexibility and capacity in response to health care system demands. Hurricanes Helene and Milton were a stark reminder of CMS requirements (including Conditions of Participation) for disaster planning to appropriately prepare for and respond to such events.

Health care providers and entities should maintain preparedness plans and understand available flexibilities to navigate emergencies in furtherance of the goal of continuity of care during times of natural disasters.