Anthem Blue Cross, the country’s second-biggest health insurance company, is behind on billions of dollars in payments owed to hospitals and doctors because of onerous new reimbursement rules, computer problems and mishandled claims, say hospital officials in multiple states. Anthem, like other big insurers, is using the COVID-19 crisis as cover to institute “egregious” policies […]
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) analyzed performance data from providers who participated in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) between 2017 and 2019 and found that some providers experienced MIPS challenges. Under MIPS, CMS monitors provider performance in four different categories: quality, improvement activities, promoting interoperability, and cost. The providers receive scores in each […]
Here is an important checklist to help you prepare for new codes effective now. On Oct. 1, the new 2022 fiscal year (FY) ICD-10-CM/PCS codes became effective. The new CM code set includes 159 new codes, 20 revised codes, and 18 deleted codes. The new ICD-10-PCS code set include 191 new codes, 62 revised titles, […]
Kaufman Hall predicts hospital operating margins will fall 80% below pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2021. Projecting cash flow always has been a challenge, but now that hospitals are operating on extremely tight margins, access to accurate projections is critical. On a related note, research from Market cube and Waystar found that fewer […]
HHS reduced the Medicare appeals backlog by 79 percent during the third quarter of FY 2021, putting the department ahead of schedule to clear the backlog. As of June 30, 2021, the end of the third quarter of FY 2021, HHS had 86,063 pending appeals remaining at the Office of Medicare Hearing and Appeals […]
Health insurance industry consolidation continued to increase, restricting consumers’ options for coverage, an American Medical Association report argued. “As merger rumors involving health insurers swirl, the prospect of future consolidation in the health insurance industry should be more closely scrutinized given the low levels of competition in most health insurance markets,” Gerald E. Harmon, […]
UnitedHealth Group, Anthem, Aetna, and Cigna returned to the list of the top five largest health insurers and one newcomer joined the list. UnitedHealth Group, Anthem, Aetna, and Cigna held onto their status as the top four largest insurers, but in 2020 Kaiser rose to fifth place. AMA was careful to point out that data […]
In the latest Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed for the first time a set of CPT codes for remote therapeutic monitoring. These codes, according to the proposal, are intended to be used to understand the effectiveness of and the patient’s response to a prescribed therapy. In particular, […]
In its simplest form, revenue cycle management is the process healthcare providers use to ask for, track, and collect revenue for services rendered to patients. But as medical billing gets more complex, revenue cycle management is expanding beyond the business office. At Jackson Hospital in Montgomery, Alabama, for example, revenue cycle management also includes […]
Surprise billing occurs when patients receive care from out-of-network providers without their knowledge. On July 1, the Biden Administration passed an interim final rule: the first portion of the “Requirements Related to the Surprise Billing Act,” in an attempt to curb excessive costs patients are required to pay in relation to surprise billing. The rule […]