CMS Opens Wider Window with Templates Open Door = Open Window Just a few weeks ago, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) opened a wider window for those of us in the ambulance industry to take a look at the future direction for supporting documentation expectations. Part of the Patients Over Paperwork Project, […]
Emergency! – Digging Deeper to Define Bloggers Note- this week our billing office had a discussion with a client to help provide direction on the question of what constitutes an emergency and the documenting of the use of “lights and sirens”. The discussion is common. Just about two years ago, we added a blog post […]
Clear. Clinical. Documentation. Bloggers note- we posted this blog almost a year ago to the day. It’s one of those topics that never gets old and the information remains as important as it was the first day we posted it. All of us must keep this important concept in mind when documenting our EMS transports. […]
The Power of a Beginner’s Mindset This week… This week several of us in the billing office had the pleasure of taking a day to re-evaluate our leadership skills. Business coach Jim Riviello of Leadership X University, author and business motivator, spent a memorable day with us as we examined our impact on the EMS […]
Winter Flu Season- How to Document? Holidays Behind Us…Enter Flu Season We trust that you had a wonderful holiday season filled with many WARM memories (and we emphasize WARM!) We’re back to our normal routine so let’s dig into a direct documentation topic…. How to document transports that are initiated either directly or indirectly due […]
Winter Weather, Injuries and EMS Documentation for Billing ‘Tis the Season! Here in the Northeast we experienced the first significant snowfall of the year. Additionally, last week saw an unprecedented ice and snow event roll through even the Deep South. Of course, all of us in EMS know that snow and ice bring falls. Bones […]
“Dear Santa”…a letter from the Billing Office We intercepted… It’s one of those things that happens. A piece of mail floated into our billing office mailbox just this week and behold it was a note to Santa from a billing office far, far away. Good ol’ Uncle Sam’s delivery guys saw billing on it and […]
Railroad Medicare Cites 32.6% Denial Rate in Widespread Review Here we go again… The Railroad Medicare program, administered by government contractor Palmetto Government Benefits Administrators (Palmetto GBA) has published the results of their latest “widespread review” of BLS Non-Emergency Transports. Here we go again… Continually, our industry is turning in dismal audit results with this […]
Repetitive Transport Documentation- Consistency is Important The Same Patient Repeat patients often suffer from chronic illnesses that persist during a period of their life span. Some patients never escape from their condition and others, thankfully improve to the point that they no longer require ambulance transportation. Because we interact with these patients, day in and […]
Compliance by Accident…is an Accident Waiting to Happen! Out of Sight…Out of Mind How many of you reading this blog, right now, have a compliance plan located somewhere in your office or somewhere in the station? You know what I mean, that big binder book with a lot of paper, plenty of words that seemingly […]
