California adopts sweeping emergency regulations for hospice providers: what the new rules require and how to prepare 
JD Supra; by Epstein Becker & Green; 7/13/26 
On June 22, 2026, emergency regulations promulgated by the California Department of Public Health (CDPH) and codified at Title 22, California Code of Regulations, sections 74800 through 74908, took effect. The emergency regulations establish detailed licensing, operational, staffing, and governance standards for hospice agencies. This new regulatory framework applies immediately to both existing hospice licensees and applicants for initial licensure. Although the emergency regulations are temporary, CDPH has indicated that it intends to make them permanent.

• What You Need to Know: ...
• What the Regulations Require: ...
• Why These Regulations Matter: ...
• What Hospice Providers Should Do Now: ...

Hospice of Westchester receives donation from NYS Tribute Foundation 
Yonkers Times, White Plains, NY; by Dan Murphy; 7/12/26 
Hospice of Westchester (HOW) recently received a $10,000 donation from NYS Tribute Foundation. The funds will support HOW’s Anna & Louis H. Shereff Bereavement Program, which provides bereavement care to patients’ families for 13 months following the loss of a loved one, as well as to all members of the community. “We are grateful to the NYS Tribute Foundation for their incredible generosity and ongoing support of our mission,” said Mary K. Spengler, RN, MS, LNHA, CEO of Hospice of Westchester. ... The NYS Tribute Foundation, which unites funeral service professionals throughout New York State, is a non-profit organization dedicated to supporting education, outreach and research programs that advance the public’s understanding of end-of-life issues.

Utilization of hospice and palliative care among patients with mental illness: a retrospective cohort study 
Journal of the American Geriatrics Society; by Sean O'Mahony, Utpol Das, Yuanyi Zhang, Anirudh S. Babu, Mukaila A. Raji, James Gerhart, Yong-Fang Kuo; 7/11/26 
Background: Individuals with mental illness (MI) experience premature mortality and health disparities, yet little is known about their access to hospice and palliative care.
Conclusions: Mental illnesses were associated with complex hospice utilization patterns characterized by longer length-of-stay, higher likelihood of enrollment far from death, lower likelihood of enrollment within 180 days before death, and lower palliative care consultation use in some groups.

The corporatization of medicine, in salaries and beds 
MedPageToday's KevinMD.com; by Brian Hudes, MD; 7/11/26 
In the 1970s, the American hospital was, in the industry’s own language, an “open workshop.” ... The doctor made the medical decisions; the administrator kept the lights on and the ledgers balanced. It was an arrangement with obvious flaws (fragmentation, duplication, uneven quality), but it rested on a clear premise: Medicine was practiced by physicians, and the institution existed to support that practice. That premise has quietly inverted. ... It is a corporation that employs them. The practice down the street has been acquired, rebranded, and folded into a system with a marketing department, a real-estate strategy, and a chief executive whose compensation would have been unimaginable to the physicians of the open-workshop era. The people who now set the direction of American medicine are, increasingly, not the people who see patients.

The Healing Page: how Akron Children's combines clinical care with narrative medicine poetry 
WOSU Public Media | NPR/PBS, Akron, OH ; by Jeff St. Clair; 7/13/26 
The written word has healing power. That’s the idea behind narrative medicine, an emerging branch of healthcare that adds creative writing to the clinical toolkit. Akron Children’s Hospital is a leader in narrative medicine, and all this week, Ideastream Public Media is highlighting the program's writers in our series "The Healing Page." Dr. Sarah Friebert is director of Akron Children's palliative care center ... said when sick kids write about what they’re going through, “We tap into an inner spring of wellness and spirituality and wholeness ..." Friebert likened a critical diagnosis to a bomb going off in a family. Her program considers the blast radius of a diagnosis by extending services to impacted family members who are encouraged to write about their experiences and feelings.

Advance Care Planning is becoming quality data: why the conversation must be documented clearly 
ICD10monitor, Inver Grove Heights, MN; by Penny Jefferson, MSN, RN, CCDS, CCDS-O, CCS, CDIP, CRC, CHDA, CRCR, CPHQ, ACPA-C; 7/13/26 
Advance care planning has always been personal. It is one of the most human conversations that occurs in healthcare. ... But advance care planning is also becoming something else: quality data. In the FY 2027 IPPS/LTCH PPS proposed rule, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) proposes adopting an Advance Care Planning electronic clinical quality measure, or eCQM, beginning with the FY 2030 payment determination. CMS also proposes adopting the same eCQM in alignment with the Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program and adopting an Advance Care Planning eCQM for the PPS-Exempt Cancer Hospital Quality Reporting Program beginning with the FY 2030 program year. 
Editor's Note: FY 2027 Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) and Long-Term Care Hospital Prospective Payment System (LTCH PPS) Proposed Rule — CMS-1849-P

CMS proposes significant changes to Medicare Provider Enrollment in CY 2027 Home Health Proposed Rule 
Mondaq | Legal500 | Intelligence; by Mary Beth Fortugno, Travis Lloyd, Julia Tamulis; 7/8/26
On July 6, 2026, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published the CY 2027 Home Health proposed rule.  CMS has proposed a significant expansion of their authority to revoke and deny Medicare enrollment and broaden disclosure obligations for all Medicare provider and supplier types, unless otherwise specified. Many of the provisions apply to hospice, home health and DMEPOS providers specifically. Among the most significant proposals, CMS would:

1. Make all revocations retroactive to the date of noncompliance.
2. Add new revocation and denial grounds based on violation of the 36-month rule, geographic concentration, and co-location with revoked providers.
3. Remove regulatory constraints on its discretion to find billing abuse and impose reapplication bars.
4. Broaden the definitions of “managing employee” and “affiliation” and eliminate the five-year lookback for affiliation disclosures.
5. Extend private equity and real estate investment trust (REIT) disclosure requirements to additional enrollment forms.

Home health advocates accuse CMS of overreach on fraud-fighting measures 
McKnights Home Care; by Liza Berger; 7/10/26 
While there has been much focus so far on the continuing behavioral adjustments in the recent home health proposed rule, there is another aspect of the rule that has drawn providers’ scorn — the harsh fraud measures. “The rule proposes significant expanded authority for CMS to deny or revoke Medicare enrollment,” Jennifer Sheets, CEO of the National Alliance for Care at Home, said during a webinar hosted by the Polsinelli law firm Thursday. “These enrollment provisions are a particular concern for us.” Sheets pointed out to a provision in the program integrity proposals that would expand the reapplication bar — prohibiting a provider from re-enrolling for up to 10 years — for any enrollment denial reason. “This really concerns us,” she said. “We think it is overreach from CMS, and that 10-year bar is a pretty scary thing to be looking at.”

Community gathers to strike out cancer and honor loved ones during awareness event 
WUFT | PBS/NPR, Gainesville, FL; by Curan Ahern; 7/12/26 
Just over one year ago, Corey Williams received the news everyone dreads: a loved one being diagnosed with cancer. A local artist, poet, videographer and father of four, Williams found out in May 2025 his fiancée, Iya Burkett, had cancer. Within a month, Williams saw the disease rapidly progress. ... Williams faced one of the worst realities a man can experience: Burkett died, and he was not prepared. ... Williams also lost his mother to cancer three years prior, leaving him to face the world without the two most important women in his life. After wrestling with the losses, he planned community events to commemorate his loved ones, raise awareness and start uncomfortable conversations about preparedness — conversations that often need to be had but are avoided. ... Along with friends and family, members of Haven Hospice’s bereavement program, Healing Hearts, showed up to support Williams and his family. Burkett worked for Haven Hospice for 13 years, and the organization helped Williams transition into life without his fiancée. 

Lessons from 70 triathlons about why enterprise software projects fail 
Forbes; by Alan Rencher for Forbes Technology Council; 7/13/26 
​In 2004, I weighed 280 pounds. ... I am not proud of how I got there. But I am genuinely grateful for what getting out of it taught me, not just about endurance training, but about the thing I have spent my career trying to get right: why enterprise software almost always fails. I have now completed 70-plus triathlons. I also have a long list of painful firsthand experiences with enterprise software that launched expensively and landed quietly in a drawer. Building it, selling it, buying it, implementing it. I have been on every side of that table. The failure modes are the same. And the reason is not what most people think.​ ...

• It is not a discipline problem. ...
• The mismatch is almost always upstream. ...
• What does good implementation actually look like? ...
• Honesty is harder than discipline. ... 

[United Kingdom] Man, 94, taking on 100-mile walking challenge 
BBC News; Andy Giddings; 7/13/26 
A man is planning to mark his 95th birthday by completing a 100-mile walking challenge for charity in memory of his wife. Smudge Smith, who lives in Telford and is a regular walker, is doing it to support Severn Hospice and hopes to complete the challenge in 100 days. His wife Margaret was cared for by the hospice in Bicton and since her death he has completed a number of fundraising walks to support it and other charities. He plans to get out each day on one of his five pre-planned routes and he will be joined by friends and family including his children Diane, Sue and David. Smith, who lives in the Ketley Bank area of Telford, set off on 3 July and aims to finish the challenge by his birthday on 14 October. 

Working hard for something we don't care about is called stress. Working hard for something we love is called passion. ~ Simon Sinek