Inane Paperwork by AJ Riviezzo A few quick items on consent to treat forms and a recommendation as well. 1. Have you reviewed your consent to treat form in the past year? If not, you may want to read through it to ensure it addresses how you are actually treating the patient and the risks […]
CMS Letter Requesting Revalidation
Keep Your Medicare On by Cheryl Nash CMS (Medicare) is systematically sending out letters to their participating Medicare providers requesting re-validation for both individual and group entities based upon your NPI numbers. You may have already received yours, or you may not have gotten this request yet. What Medicare is asking for is updated information […]
Payment for Tumescent Anesthesia
How to Ask for an Audit by AJ Riviezzo I recently received a couple different inquiries asking about using an anesthesia code. The theory is that the tumescent ‘anesthesia’ that is delivered during an ablation should be reimbursed. Further, each of the practices contacting me know SOMEONE who is being paid for these codes. […]
Making Corrections to Medical Records
The Legal Requirements by Cheryl Nash Mistakes, we all make them occasionally, but what to do when the mistake is in a patient’s medical record? As with all things in this business, there are some legal requirements when a correction needs to be made. First, we need to identify what type of correction and […]
Auditing Your Billing Services
Stop any Bleeding Early by AJ Riviezzo As a billing and collections company, we get to see the end results of some rather interesting problems that a practice has had with either their old billing company or with their in house biller. Below are a few items that the practice manager or physician management may […]
Conservative Therapy Management
Confusion and Documentation Tips by Cheryl Nash There has been some confusion in the phelebology community regarding conservative treatment guidelines and compression stockings. Questions such as how long, what constitutes proof, does the provider have to initiate the treatment or can he take the patient’s word for it, and how recently should this have been […]
Free Consults
An Educational Visit by AJ Riviezzo A large number of practices offer a free consultation in their advertising. It is a great way for both parties, the practice and the patient, to size up each other up. The patient is able to delay the purchasing decision and allows for some information to be exchanged […]
Sclerotherapy
What Defines Medical Necessity by Cheryl Nash There is always some confusion on what exactly defines ‘medical necessity’ for sclerotherapy. Like all treatments in Phlebology, this answer can really depend on who you are talking to. More specifically, which payer you are working with. As in all things in this business, the individual requirements are […]
Rural Phlebology Marketing
Outreach Efforts to a Different Clientele by AJ Riviezzo While I may currently live in a metropolitan area (Colorado Springs), I have had the good fortune to work with many rural healthcare providers located throughout southern Colorado. I also served on the Colorado Rural Healthcare task force that had meetings throughout the state. To further […]
2013 OIG Work Plan
Claim Errors and Audits by Cheryl Nash This is a short analysis of the 2013 Office of the Inspector General (OIG) work plan released showing the key items that they will be focusing on this year. As with each year, I try to review this to locate any items that may affect Phlebology in […]