When Nancy Herr, RN, BSN, CCM, manager of utilization review at Liberty (MO) Hospital, started seeing an uptick in RAC audits late in 2010, she knew she needed a way to track activity and share it with others in her facility.
HHS' OCR in February began using the new fine structure mandated by HITECH and handed one of the country's most prestigious hospitals, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston, a $1 million penalty for a breach violation.
The company, based in Prince George's County, MD, got hit in February with OCR's first civil money penalty for violations of the HIPAA Privacy Rule-a $4.3 million tab that included $3 million for failing to cooperate with the agency's investigation. OCR determined Cignet acted with "willful neglect" and did not take action to correct the violations, which allowed the agency to impose the highest level of fines based on its tiered penalty structure.
We received more than 700 responses to the 2011 Case Management Monthly Salary Surveyfrom RN case managers (51%), case management directors (23%), case management managers/supervisors (16%), and social work (SW) case managers from all over the country.
There are some Joint Commission EPs with which almost all hospital HIM departments struggle. Surveyors continue to focus on them, so chances are you should too.
The ACMA has received a document from CMS that answers questions that ACMA members posed to the agency about delivering the Important Message from Medicare (IM).