To comply with the HIPAA omnibus final rule, healthcare organizations need to revise their risk assessment process to determine whether they must notify affected individuals of a breach.
Coders select E/M levels based on criteria developed by their organization. CMS has proposed a significant change to E/M coding-replacing the current 20 E/M levels for new patients, existing patients, and ED visits with three G codes-but that change would only apply to Medicare patients and only to the facility side.
With some major changes in look and form-but generally adhering to existing guidelines-coding for neoplasms serves as a microcosm of the changes providers will face when the transition to ICD-10-CM occurs October 1, 2014.
Our experts answer questions about followup visits in the ED, skin substitutes, flu vaccines, osteoporosis and fractures in ICD-10-CM, ICD-10-CM external cause code, modifier for discontinued cardioversion, and modifier -25
Doctors might know what's best for their patients, but patients don't always choose to follow that advice. Over these past few issues, CMM has talked about CMS' new suggested best practices, which were included in revisions to the discharge planning section of the CMS State Operations Manual. These new recommendations call on facilities to carefully investigate patients' refusals to heed medical advice and document their reasons for doing so. However, there is more you can do when a patient balks at a physician's instructions, says Wendy De Vreugd, RN, BSN, PHN, FNP, CCDS, MBA, senior director of case management at West Region Kindred Healthcare, Hospital Division.
Q. Is it acceptable for admitting and patient registration staff to photograph patients upon check- in for identification purposes? Is it permissible to take pictures of behavioral health patients for the same purpose?
