Columbia, S.C. – Palmetto GBA, the Medicare Administrative Contractor for home health care in 16 states, will host a conference here this month to address the issue of insufficient documentation in a particular area of home health claims.
Physicians and home health providers from the 16 states are invited to attend the free conference, which will take place 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m. July 30 at Palmetto GBA, 17 Technology Circle, Columbia. The states include South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas, New Mexico and Oklahoma.
Major sources of denials among Medicare home health providers involve the documentation of physicians’ face-to-face patient encounters.
The conference presentations will focus on Palmetto GBA’s Health Information Supply ChainSM approach to “getting it right the first time,” used by five home health agencies to improve their operational and financial performance. Each Lean/Six SigmaSM event had the objective of reducing documentation errors by studying and reframing the process of creating and submitting claims within the context of an information supply chain.
The presenters will share the approach, pilot discoveries, initiatives implemented and results from this effort.
“These documentation errors contributed to a projected $8.4 billion in improper Medicare payments in fiscal year 2014. We want to help rectify this with clear communication in a collaborative setting in which we and physicians and home health agencies offer guidance, process improvement examples and answer questions,” said Palmetto GBA Senior Medical Director Harry Feliciano, M.D., MPH.
To reserve a seat or find out more about the conference, home health agencies and physicians should use this link: Organizational Process Improvement Coaching Project (OPICP) Conference.
New users must first create a profile. To create a profile, select the “Create Profile” link under the login button on the blue menu bar, and follow the instructions. Existing users may log into their Event Registration Portal account to sign up themselves or others .
Based in Columbia, Palmetto GBA (www.PalmettoGBA.com) provides technical and administrative services on behalf of the federal government, principally for the Medicare program. In addition to its headquarters in South Carolina, the company also has offices in Georgia and Ohio.