After announcing a lower cap the week before, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) did an about-face and increased the hospice cap for fiscal 2005, which ends Oct. 31.

The cap now is $19,777.51, according to CMS Transmittal 663, which was released Aug. 26. The document replaces Transmittal 655, dated Aug. 19, which had announced a cap of $18,963.47.
 
The new cap represents an increase of $814.04 from what was published Aug. 19, but is $141.84 lower than the fiscal 2004 cap. However, the '04 cap is going to change as well. CMS says it was "incorrectly computed" and will be corrected in a future transmittal. The agency hasn't specified whether the adjusted cap will be higher or lower.

The hospice cap is raised or lowered by the same percentage as the increase or decrease in the medical care expenditure category of the Consumer Price Index for all Urban Consumers, CMS explains in the transmittal.