The date of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' adoption of the new 2012 Life Safety Code is unknown, but a good guess would be the spring of 2015, according to a blog by Brad Keyes on the FacilityCare website.
"CMS has already issued its proposed rule to adopt the 2012 edition of the LSC and is in the process of reviewing the public’s comments. If history is an indicator of future events, I suspect CMS will issue a final rule to adopt the 2012 edition in spring 2015, and it will likely set an effective date 60 days after that," Keyes wrote.
But, instead of worrying about the "when," the healthcare industry should focus on meeting the changes that the new code will bring, the blog said. Many of the changes will lessen the workload of the facility manager but some changes will actually require more work and planning. Facility managers should consider starting now so their facilities will be compliant by the time the new code is adopted.