ICD-10- How Will It Change EMS Documentation? Part II Welcome to Part II of our two-part series! Last week we talked about the overall changes that ICD-10 will usher in come October 1st and we focused on the detail and specifics needed in Patient Care Reports in order to provide...
ICD-10- How will it change EMS Documentation? 117 Days and Counting! Change is coming. Today is exactly 117 days away from the October 1st implementation of the ICD-10 diagnosis codes. ICD stands for the International Classification of Diseases. Today, our industry uses Version 9 of the code set to report conditions...
Sign-In Please! “Will the next mystery guest sign-in please?” Back in the sixties there was this popular TV show that began with this question. The viewer got to see who the celebrity was based on the person’s signature and the contestants had to guess who the person was by asking...
Will the Real Superhero Please Stand Up? It Starts Monday! Next week is EMS week! Starting on Monday, we take time in the U.S.A. to recognize all of you who do so much to bring healing, comfort and care to your community. Monday kicks off not only EMS week but...
CMS Releases Further Clarification and Guidance about Prior Authorizations Here to Stay The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Prior Authorization Demonstration Project is here to stay. Put in place by CMS as a pilot project in the States of New Jersey, Pennsylvania and South Carolina in December, 2014;...
On Drop Downs and Written Narratives- Connecting the Data in our PCRs “Paint a Picture” We read a lot of communication that point to expectations. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), State agencies and even Commercial Insurance payers bombard our billing office with all kind of communication about...
H.R. 2 and You Last Week Last week Congress passed the “Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015.” The Bill, H.R. 2, contained an important provision for the ambulance industry and it passed on the brink of allowing the Medicare ground ambulance bonus payments to expire. The extension effected...
The Importance of Building and Maintaining Relationships Beyond EMS – Part 2 Last week… This is the second part of a two-part series about building relationships within the healthcare community but outside of your EMS circles. Last week we explored why this is necessary and who we should be building...
The Importance of Building and Maintaining Relationships Beyond EMS More and More… More and more we in EMS are being called upon to interact and develop relationships that go beyond our brothers and sisters in the Fire/EMS arena. It doesn’t matter what level of the organizational chart you serve, we...
What the “Permanent Doc Fix” Means for EMS Yesterday Yesterday, March 26, 2015, the U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of H.R. 2 to do away with Medicare’s sustainable growth-rate formula and to pass what is commonly known as the permanent doc fix. Uncertainty Remains While the House passed...
