December 22 2025
OASIS Answers
Categories: HOPE

Untangling the Confusion Around HOPE SFVs: Part 2 – How to Document SFVs

by Marian Essey, RN, BSN, COS-C

This 3-part series explores HOPE Symptom Update Visits (SFVs): 1) what is an SFV, 2) how to document SFVs, 3) how to operationalize SFVs

Part 2: How to document an SFV

In Part 1 of this series, we learned that an SFV is part of the HOPE Admission or HOPE Update Visit 1 (HUV1) or HOPE Update Visit 2 (HUV2). But what does that mean? And how do we document an SFV?

Let’s begin by visualizing how the SFV occurs, what HOPE items to document, and who documents the SFV items.

Let’s start with you! You just finished your HOPE Admission where you coded J2051 – Symptom Impact as moderate for the symptom impact for “C. anxiety”. All other symptoms had their impact coded as “9. Not applicable (the patient is not experiencing the symptom)”. Having ANY symptom in J2051 – Symptom Impact coded as moderate or severe triggers the need for an SFV.

Reminder: The SFV may occur anytime within two calendar days, or later on the same day as the assessment where the initial finding of a moderate or severe symptom impact was determined.

You contact your supervisor and he schedules you to complete the SFV tomorrow.

Now what do you document and where?

Begin by NOT finishing (i.e., not signing off or not submitting) your HOPE Admission. You will document the SFV ON the HOPE Admission. While it’s a separate visit, since it was triggered by your HOPE Admission, you’ll document the SFV as part of the HOPE Admission.

When you visit the patient again tomorrow, you document the SFV by completing 2 HOPE items on the HOPE Admission Assessment (+ any documentation required by your hospice):

J2052 – Symptom Follow-up Visit, and
J2053 – SFV Symptom Impact

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