It’s Finally Here! It seems like forever ago… It seems like forever ago we began talking about this thing called ICD-10. Delay after delay, extension after extension and here we are. Thursday is the day the American healthcare industry has long been anticipating. ICD-10 is finally here! Boil it all down Boil it all down, […]
Behind on PCRs? Focus! Frustration Frustration reigns in the billing office when there are an x-number of your EMS agency’s runs that have yet to be turned into Patient Care Reports (PCRs) for billing submission. As we think about our own field experiences and we watch our colleagues, we find the problem of unwritten Patient […]
Closest Appropriate? Explaining Destinations in the PCR Closest Appropriate Facility In the ambulance billing world, this 3-word phrase is discussed more than you’d realize- Closest Appropriate Facility. There are rules that differ in many cases between insurance payers, most notably between Medicare and Medicaid and even some commercial insurance payers regarding payment for transport miles […]
Sharpening Documentation Skills Using Hands-On Training How will they learn? The Apostle Paul wrote a letter to the early church in Rome to encourage the early first-century believers to actively share their faith with others. He used a series of questions to make his point. “But how can they call on him to save them […]
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 when we submit claims for […]
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 questions about the person. Signatures […]
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 what they expect to be […]
What do I need to do? The Big Question As we talk with people in the industry, administrators and street providers alike, we field this question the most. “What do I need to write/not write in my Patient Care Report?” The companion discussion always centers on… “Can you provide me a “list” of things we […]
Shorter Timelines = Greater Dollar$ The time between… Rising costs and stale reimbursement is causing everyone in the EMS industry to take a long hard look at the bottom line. Today we’ll be focusing on three key parts of the billing timeline. Do you know what the time is that lapses between the incident and […]
The Puzzle EMS Billing Has Become The missing piece… Have you ever put together a puzzle and found near the end that you are missing a piece or two? It’s frustrating; isn’t it? You have just enough of the pieces put together that you can see the picture you are creating and yet those key […]
