When it comes to payer contracting, there are some key provisions that you must take seriously. In the past, there were only a few contract elements that were of interest to the provider or practice leadership: fee schedule with carve outs, timely payment of claims,...
Workplace violence has been at the forefront of news reports lately and violence against healthcare workers has risen over the past several years. It’s a topic that is sometimes overlooked and can only be eradicated through conversation, education, and solid safety...
The exchange or release of health information is essential to the provision of high quality and cost-effective health care. The information released should be within the scope of the request, complete based on the nature of the request and submitted timely. This...
Historically, OSHA has been stable in their physician regulations, but the COVID era altered that equation. OSHA had been relatively quiet through the pandemic, letting the CDC do most of the heavy lifting, but since practices opened back up in May 2020 there has been...
An emergency operations plan (EOP) is your best defense against a disaster, lawsuit, and repetitional damage. In 2017, CMS outlined to17 healthcare entities that to participate in CMS, they must have a plan. Though physician practices are not part of the 17, it is...
In a response to the healthcare community’s desire to lessen the administrative burden on HIPAA covered entities, the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) issued a request of information (RFI) in December of 2018. Two years later, after this RFI comment period closed, the OCR...
ELEMENTS may seem like an unusual name for a newsletter but for us, the word is pretty much of a North Star. We use the “7 Elements of Compliance “to guide everything we do. A little history by way of explanation. In the mid 1990’s the CDC, OSHA and other government...
When the COVID-19 pandemic reached our shores, it instantly changed the way we lived and worked. Many businesses were shuttered, and most people have yet to return to their offices since the March 2020 lockdowns. Virtual meetings, remote learning and limited socially...
The proposed rule includes a single payment for new and established patient office visits, elimination of the history and physical examination documentation requirements, and heightened emphasis on the medical decision-making (MDM) and time elements....