Health Information Compliance Alert

Published on Fri Aug 29, 2003 PDF

They say time is money, and for covered entities, the hours used to ensure transactions compliance will surely be time well spent. For those of you down to the wire with TCS compliance, take a look at this short list of items offered by Bill Sarraille in the DC office of Sidley Austin Brown & Wood, to help ensure HIPAA-compliant claims.        

1. Contact all vendors of software and hardware, with particular attention to any clearinghouse that you will use.  
  
2. Determine that vendors have engaged in claims testing, and that they have fared well in the testing.
 
3. Determine if vendors will be supporting some of the standard transactions that many vendors will not, such as status queries on claims that have been submitted but not paid (this transaction could have tremendous value to providers' A/R efforts).
 
4. Contact your payers and ask them if they will be compliant by the compliance deadline.
 
5. If you won't be compliant on the deadline day and your payers say that they will, get one of your state associations - or your counsel - to anonymously inquire for you what the payer intends to do with non-conforming transactions.