2014 Federal Withholding Rates

The federal withholding rates for 2014 will be included in tonight’s update.

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Patient “Grid”

On the main screen of the HHC3000 software you will see a small button on the Patients button labeled “Grid.”  This is an example of the screen that will soon be what shows when the patient button is pushed.  The reason for having to change to this screen is for HIPAA compliance, in that we need to start internally recording who is entering/viewing patient information.  Although the current format is often convenient for changing from one patient to another, the format does not lend itself very well to recording the information required for HIPAA compliance.

In this screen you will have to select the patient from the grid first, and then open up the patient screens.  We added some filters to the top of the grid that might be helpful in grouping patients.

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Speech Therapy Assessments

The update that went out over the weekend for both the main software and clinical notebook software includes the speech therapy assessments that were mentioned in last week’s message.

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Update on New Clinical Forms

We have completed the Speech Therapy assessments which we will be including in one of the updates this week.  We will inform you when that update is available.  We took the approach similar to the PT and OT Progress Notes except that there are more options in the type of assessment drop down box.  After selecting to add a visit assessment, you will select to add Speech Therapy.  Once inside the speech therapy assessment, the first field is the “Type of Assessment.”  The drop down options will include:  ST Progress Note, ST Dysphagia Visit , ST Cognative Language Visit, ST Speech Language Visit, ST Functional Assessment, ST Evaluation Assessment.

A new Pediatric/New Born assessment is nearing completion and will become available hopefully next week.  Next on our priority list for clinical forms are a Hospice Bereavement Assessment and a Spiritual Assessment.

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Ohio State Withholding Rates

The new Ohio employee withholding rates that became effective September 1, 2013, are included with the most recent software version that was made available today.  This new rates should overall reduce the employee withholding by approximately 8.5 %.

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Physical & Occupational Therapy Visits

A few weeks ago we made changes to therapy visits, which were previously called PT Progress Notes and OT Progress Notes.  Over the years we have spent considerable time changing therapy assessments and therapy visits trying to come up with one form that would satisfy all agencies.  Some agencies wanted extensive data collection, others wanted less data collection.

What we did was come up with three different formats for the physical and occupational therapy visits records.  When you open up the data collection screens there is a “Type of Note” drop-down option to classify the visit as a Visit Note, Progress Note, or Functional Assessment.  The visit note collects the least amount of data, the progress note collects more data, the functional assessment collects the most amount of data and can be used as a therapy assessment but it’s attached to the visit.  Prior to this change the assessment had to be completed separate from the visit.  You may want to open up a therapy visit, change the type of note, and browse the different data entry screens to see the differences to determine which formats work best for your situations.

At the request of several of our agencies we a working on completing a speech therapy assessment along and speech therapy visits.  We will be taking the same approach with speech therapy.

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MSW Assessment – Physician Signature

Several agencies have asked us to put the physician signature box on the MSW assessment printout.  Last night’s update includes this change.

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Office Security

We  made a couple of changes that affect employees that have office security established for more than one office.  Those employees will see a office drop down box at the top right hand corner of the main screen which will allow them to change offices without having to exit the software and log back in under a different office.  We have also added similar drop down boxes in patient and employee maintenance.  Sometime in the future we plan to change reports to allow these users to select any one of their approved offices in the reports.

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Adding HIPPS Codes to Non-PPS Billing

Just recently, some of the Medicare HMO’s and other insurance companies that do not use PPS billing have asked that the HIPPS code be added to the UB04.  Most have made this a requirement as of July 1, 2013 billing; several have stated that they will not start the edit checks until September.  Most of our agencies were surprised at how little advanced warning they were given.

Version 5285 available tonight will include this feature.  To add HIPPS codes to the UB04 or ANSI 5010 billing there is a new check box under Insurance / UB04 / Services and Supplies labeled “Show HIPPS code on invoices / ANSI 5010.”  There is also another field to designate if you want the dollar amount to be $0.00, $0.01, $1.00.  Our experience with the HIPPS codes in PPS billing shows us that it will differ by insurance company.  In addition, in ANSI 5010 billing we are defaulting to units of ‘1’ to eliminate possible rejections.  Some insurance companies software will not accept units of ‘0’.

Adding the HIPPS code is somewhat cumbersome in that agencies will be billing by the week or month independent of OASIS assessment certification periods, that could start or end in the middle of the week or month.  In addition the OASIS could be dated before the beginning of the billing period and would reject if we used that date on the invoice or in the file because the date is outside of the billing visit date range. The insurance companies have stated they want the HIPPS code to show first on the invoice which is another factor.  We made the decision that system will always list the HIPPS code on the invoice first using the same date as the first billable visit.

What the system will do is look for the most recent OASIS assessment with a SOC or completion date that is prior to or within 5 days of the first billable visit of the invoice.  For now the system will ignore OASIS assessments that may occur beyond five days after the first visit on the invoice.

There are other insurance company specific factors that could cause problems with the ANSI 5010 billing.  We will address these as they arise.  Thanks in advance for your support as we deal with these new challenges.

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Medicare Advantage Plans – ANSI Billing

We have very recently been notified that as of July 1, 2013, Medicare Advantage Plan claims need to include an OASIS HIPPS code record.  Medicare Advantage claims are usually billed electronically under the ANSI 5010 billing.  What we plan to do is add a check box somewhere in Insurances that the user wants the OASIS HIPPS code included on the claims.  If checked, when the claim is created the system will search OASIS records to obtain the appropriate HIPPS code.  We plan to compare the first billable visit of the claim with the certification period of the OASIS in order to select the correct OASIS assessment.  We plan to have these changes completed by the end of this week.  We will give specifics when the changes are complete.

It is our understanding that the electronic edit checking will not take place until September but we are not sure all plans will wait till then.

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