ASC Coding, Billing & Collections

EMH Regional Medical Center in Elyria, Ohio, and North Ohio Heart Center have agreed to pay the government a combined $4.4 million to resolve allegations that they submitted false claims to Medicare.

The Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 created the Recovery Audit Contractor Program to reduce improper Medicare payments, and since its inception, the program has collected more than $2.5 billion in overpayments, as of August 2012.

Last year, the HIPAA electronic claims standard changed from version 4010 to 5010, and the transition served as a lesson for the upcoming switch from ICD-9 to ICD-10.

Jacksonville, Fla.-based American Sleep Medicine will pay $15.3 million to settle accusations it billed Medicare, TRICARE and the Railroad Retirement Medicare Program for services not eligible for reimbursements, according to ENews Park Forest.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' Office of E-Health Standards and Services will delay enforcement of operating rules on electronic exchange of information that would make providers eligibility for health plan and healthcare claim status for three months, according…

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced it will not initiate enforcement of HIPAA-covered entities that are not in compliance with Affordable Care Act eligibility requirements until March 1.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services is crafting a comprehensive testing program for the ICD-10 transition to avoid confusion similar to the HIPAA 5010 transaction and is seeking provider input, according to ICD-10 Watch.

Highmark and Coordinated Health, both based in Pennsylvania, have settled a dispute over hospital payments that lasted nearly four months, according to a MedCity News report.

The Oregon Community Health Information Network has been awarded $775,000 per year for three years by the federal government to meet several healthcare technology goals, according to Healthcare IT News.

Passage of the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 in a vote by the House of Representatives late Tuesday averted a 26.5 percent cut in the Medicare sustainable growth rate formula and held off an additional 2 percent for two…