Friday, March 30, 2018

Is Your Team Risk Ready?

What will define those who claim victory and those who are defeated in the battle towards value based care? Will it be those organizations with the most money, power and seats at the table? Or will it be those who are nimble, flexible and open to change?

 I believe it will be both. As victory will not be defined by the owners and head coaches but instead by how the players execute on the field. It will be the game time decisions that matter most.

A quarterback who can read the defense and adjust accordingly will provide far greater value to the offense than the most athletic quarterback who misses the blitz every time.

Perhaps Napoleon said it best, “Battles are won by the power of the mind.” For in a game of inches, the winners and losers will be defined by those who can execute in the moments that matter most.

Prepare your team for victory with information at the point of care!

ERM Consulting has developed the industries best tools for players on the frontline.



This 42 page guide includes proper ICD-10 coding and clinical documentation for the most common diagnoses included in the risk models. A complete list of CMS-HCCs with RAF and demographics included. Order 1 for your entire team! Orders of 100 or more can be white labeled with your logo at no charge. Please email logo to kgifford@ermconsultinginc.com after purchase.




This 36 page guide contains a list of the most common HCC codes in the Medicare (CMS-HCC) model. Includes both medical (HCC) and pharmacy (RxHCC) codes. Orders of 100 or more can be white labeled with your logo at no charge. Please email logo to kgifford@ermconsultinginc.com after purchase. 








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Tuesday, March 27, 2018

UHC Implements Mandatory Reviews of Level 4 and 5 ED Codes

Image result for emergency room

Three key takeaways from this effort by healthcare giant UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare (UHC) is continuing its quest to revamp many facets of our healthcare industry. Last year, they adapted mandatory policies for the use of the SA modifier to indicate that a professional service was performed as incident-to, and now the company is introducing a mandatory review of high-level ED facility-based service codes.
The newest UHC policy took effect March 1 and applies to both UHC’s commercial plans and its Medicare Advantage plans, as well as claims submitted to UHC from non-participating facilities.
Organizations that submit claims to UHC have begun to see a dramatic change in coding policy, with emergency department (ED) service codes of Level 4 and 5 now undergoing review for adjustment or outright denial.
Let’s review the policy change and the explanation posted by UHC, and then we will walk through concerns providers have including the following:
Simply selecting ED codes 99284 and 99285, which represent moderate-complexity and high-complexity cases, will result in the claim being reviewed by UHC using its Optum Emergency Department Claim (EDC) Analyzer tool, which is a software module that supposedly “systematically evaluates each ED visit level code in the context of other claim data (i.e., diagnosis codes, procedure codes, patient age, and patient gender) to ensure that it reasonably relates to the intensity of hospital resource utilization as required per CMS (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services) guidelines.”
UHC stated in its December 2017 bulletin, that the other ED codes, 99281-99283 (in the same family of codes) will not be subject to this automatic review by the EDC tool. UHC further stated that those facilities submitting claims with 99284 or 99285 will have those claims “adjusted” in level, which is to say downcoded, or completely denied, based on “the reimbursement structure within their agreements with UnitedHealthcare,”.
There are some exceptions to the automatic EDC review, which include:
  • Admissions from the ED;
  • Critical care patients;
  • Patients younger than 2 years of age;
  • Certain diagnoses requiring greater-than-average resource use when performed in the ED;
  • Patients who die in the ED; and
  • Facilities whose billing of Level 4 and 5 evaluation and management (E&M) codes does not abnormally deviate from Optum's EDC Analyzer tool determination.
Facilities that see either a reduction in their ED code levels or denials will be able to submit reconsideration or appeal requests if they disagree with the EDC analyzer’s findings and the subsequent “adjustments,” according to the UHC bulletin. The massive increase in scrutiny created by this new policy is needed, UHC said, to “support UnitedHealthcare’s commitment to the triple aim of improving healthcare services, health outcomes, and overall cost of care.”
 Now, let’s break it all down:
 Facility coding guidelines are different from professional coding guidelines. Therefore, although the codes used to bill and support the facility-based services are the same, the utilization of these codes are quite different. When reported for Facility services codes are chosen based on the volume and intensity of resources utilized by the facility to provide patient care. In fact, while physicians pay homage to documentation guidelines with every single service they provide, CMS has yet to create a standard by which facility ED codes are applied to an encounter.
ACEP has created a set of standards than many ED’s across the country have adopted, and therefore has become somewhat of an industry standard, but again- previously no formal process has been adapted. Therefore, many would stay that there is no definitive correlation between facility and professional coding and therefore no rational basis for the application of one set of codes for the determination of the other on a case-by-case basis.  However, when we begin to review the steps the EDC analyzer will evaluate the line between facility services, and the professional use of the code set begins to get lost in the sand.
According to the EDC analyzer (https://edcanalyzer.com/EDCAnalyzerGuide/Overview), Step one is a consideration of the level of risk of the patient’s presenting problem to drive the standard resource valuation for the presenting problems in that ED visit level and include the costs associated with the following:
  1. Nursing and ancillary staff time (for a routine arrival, triage, registration, basic patient/family communications, and a routine discharge)
  2. The room
  3. Creation of a medical record
  4. Coding and billing

These four resource valuations are driven by the risk associated with the patient’s presenting problem as referenced within the MDM scoring process for professional based services. So, while these coding systems are supposed to be different, we begin to see how the facility service is also driven by the complexity of care of the patient identifying their stated medical necessity. While medical necessity should be the determination of what is billed and why it should be reimbursed, the problem in UHC’s step one determination is the initial weighted costs related to the presenting problem.
For clarity, this methodology is better explained with an example. The weight of a patient presenting for a blood pressure check may seem anteriorly low, but if their blood pressure is severely high, then our presenting problem just increased 1-2 levels to a higher level of severity, which depending on the severity may pose imminent threat to support the highest cost weight category.
Step two within the EDC provides for a review of all line-level services on the claim to identify diagnostic tests as follows: 
  • Laboratory tests
  • X-ray tests (film)
  • EKG/RT/other diagnostic tests
  • CT/MRI/ultrasound tests
Consideration was allowed to provide for costs of creating orders, time and staffing to provide the testing, and communication with the patient. These cost weights are then added together per each category to find the total weighted consideration. WOW, this sounds much like the data and complexity section of MDM scoring of professional services but extending them beyond the scope of the physician service and realizing the facility burden associated with each category of service.
Step 3 will then take into all diagnoses assigned to the patient that may impact utilization of resources based on complicating factors, i.e., the risk imposed by the patients care level needed. UHC has indicated that they have Patient complexity cost weights that were developed for each complicating condition by analyzing the additional services typically provided to patients with that complicating condition. UHC provides examples of diagnoses and conditions that they have weighted. However, they do not provide the weighted costs associated with each.
UHC’s final step, once again, sounds suspiciously comparative to professional services as we will use the 3 categories to assess our service collectively. The formula they have published is the following:
Total Weight = Standard Cost Weight (Step 1) + Extended Cost Weight (Step 2) + Patient Complexity Cost Weight (Step 3)
Translation:
Pricing = resources required based on presenting problem + resources expended based on Categories of service used + the potential resources consumed based on the diagnoses of the encounter
There is one curiosity that the EDC by UHC does not indicate and that is the weighted cost of each step. This information has been redacted from their website and not published, and therefore we do not know exactly the scoring process that has been implemented. At least on the professional services side, the scoring process of the medical decision making (MDM) —again comparative in nature— does provide us with the guidance of the weight of each element to support the overall service. However, UHC has chosen to keep this information confidential.
So let’s apply this to a condition. There are two words that when put together, escalate care in the ED: chest pain. I do realize that facilities have protocol requirements for this type of scenario, but before we engage in a debate, please be reminded that is a facility’s protocol and not the carrier’s. Unless the medical necessity can support the appropriateness of the services rendered, the carrier may decline reimbursements.
However, let’s proceed. Patient reports to the ED for chest pain and of course lab, radiology, and diagnostic testing is performed, but ultimately it is determined that the patient’s problem is merely heartburn and they are discharged to home. The UHC EDC would consider our formula as follows:
Remember your algebra rules for this one:
Total Weight = Chest pain + (lab + Radiology + EKG) + GERD
Translation:
Pricing = Extensive resources needed for chest pain presenting problem + 3 categories of service line resources + a lower resource consuming formal diagnosis of the encounter

In conclusion, three final points:
  • Industry Modeling: UHC has created a “scoring methodology” through what they consider an analytics program, but what it really seems like is they have tried to use E&M Documentation Guidelines for Professional Services to create an industry modeling scoring of these facility-based services. Now come on, everyone knows how gray and ambiguous E&M Guidelines are, and let’s get serious… the MDM is one of the MOST troublesome parts! Therefore, it seems this may end up causing more confusion as opposed to providing valued guidance.
  • UHC Mandatory Automatic Reviews: This policy has provided some basis for facilities to better apply the proper ED service code, but it will likely raise overhead expenses on both sides. As we pointed out through this article, much of this scoring process is based on MDM related scoring principals which are gray and ambiguous at best and part of Marshfield Guidelines, which “technically” have never been formally adopted as part of the official guidelines. Now facilities will be required to produce proof to substantiate every single level 4 and 5 encounter through an appeal process. Additionally, UHC is now going to have to review every single appealed encounter. Who loses? Patients! This increased overhead will affect them on both sides: as a consumer and an insured.
  • Data Analytics Reviews: It’s the new buzz-phrase in healthcare. Not only has data analytics created new avenues in which carriers can track all services by facilities and providers, but more importanty, facilities and providers can now analyze their own risk and focus on their compliance dollars. However, analytics cannot assess medical necessity regardless of the type of service- be it facility or professional. Keep in mind that UHC essentially has an algorithm that raises red flags of alert, but that should only be a flag, as it truly takes a reviewer to analyze services for medical necessity.
Is the point of this policy to encourage undercoding? Maybe, but rather than point fingers in this way, let’s ponder for just a moment what this policy still does not do. It does not provide an avenue to educate the masses on the proper use of these codes. Instead, this policy will increase labor by driving unnecessary medical reviews.
We need the carriers to back educational efforts to help improve code usage, rather than introducing burdensome policies that increase healthcare costs to all involved.


Wednesday, March 7, 2018

Chronic Pain as a Driver of Cost in ACO Arrangements


The American Journal of Accountable Care. 2018;6(1):29-32

Much has been written about the crippling effect of America’s overreliance on opioids and the country’s ongoing chronic pain crisis.1 Major news outlets have chronicled the tragic individual circumstances, often focusing on rural communities and overwhelmed primary care providers (PCPs). Simultaneous to this pain and opioid crisis, there has been an expansion in alternative payment models, such as accountable care organizations (ACOs), in which providers take on some degree of financial risk for the total cost of care for a population based on outcomes and quality metrics. As a result of taking on financial risk, the hope is that providers will care for patients using a more holistic approach and may be increasingly involved in treating conditions that pay poorly in a fee-for-service (FFS) environment but have a significant impact on the total cost of care (eg, behavioral health conditions).

At University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Health, we currently participate in a number of commercial ACOs. This arrangement motivated us to understand what conditions drive the total cost of care. Chronic pain has been a hot topic, but this is the first exploration of chronic pain in the ACO context at a major academic medical center. As a result of clinical expertise on our ACO team, we asked the question: Do our patients with chronic pain have greater-than-​expected healthcare utilization? If so, can we design interventions that improve the quality of care while simultaneously decreasing costs? Anecdotally, providers felt that patients with uncontrolled pain often sought care in the emergency department (ED) and perhaps had longer lengths of stay when they were admitted to the hospital. 

To answer these questions, we analyzed both the prevalence of chronic pain in the UCSF Health ACO population and its link to utilization. Using the Tian et al algorithm,2 we identified that nearly 20% of the UCSF Health commercial ACO populations had chronic pain. The rate of chronic pain at UCSF Health was nearly identical to the rate of hypertension and 3 times the rate of diabetes there. This algorithm was based on billing coding, pain scores, and prescription medications and was validated with reported sensitivity and specificity of 84.8% and 97.7%, respectively. Tian et al reported more accurate identification of patients with chronic pain using their algorithm than estimates based on pain scores or International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision codes alone. Given the high specificity of the Tian algorithm, the 20% chronic pain prevalence may be conservative. Epidemiologic estimates of the prevalence of chronic pain have historically varied, ranging from 2% to 45% of primary care populations.3 Most recently, an analysis of the 2012 National Health Interview Survey estimated 126.1 million American adults as reporting pain in the previous 3 months and 25.3 million adults suffering daily pain.4

Substantiating clinicians’ instincts, subsequent analysis of utilization patterns among UCSF Health ACO patients indicated that patients with chronic pain had 2 to 3 times the rates of ED, inpatient, urgent care, and primary care visits compared with patients without chronic pain (Table 1). Utilization was used as a proxy for cost.5 

Given the finding that chronic pain was highly prevalent in our ACOs and was associated with increased overall utilization of healthcare services, we considered the current state of pain management and possibilities for improvement. We interviewed over 30 internal stakeholders and external experts, including PCPs, pain management specialists, alternative medicine providers, general and pain-specific psychiatrists, physical therapists, opioid specialists, inpatient pain nurses, and representatives from a local integrated pain treatment center. We found that pain management was divided into silos of excellence within UCSF, with limited communication or coordination of services between providers. Providers described limited integration and misaligned expectations between PCPs and specialists.

Guided by these interviews with clinicians at the front lines and based on evidence in the literature and proposals suggested by the individuals we interviewed, we identified the following opportunities for redesigning chronic pain management (specific solutions are outlined in Table 2):

Education

Physicians and other healthcare providers need education and training in pain management. Less than half of US medical schools dedicate more than 10 teaching hours to pain management, resulting in underprepared physicians.6 Similarly, the goals of pain education could be reframed to focus on patient communication and multimodal treatment while approaching medications as just one part of a broader plan. In addition to provider education, patients must understand the risks of pain management and be informed so they can set realistic expectations and be active participants in shared decision making. As chronic pain has not been a point of emphasis in the past, changing medical education would require both individual institution- and national-level changes in curriculum development. 

Communication and Coordination of Care

Improvement in clinical chronic pain management could involve change at 2 levels: primary care and specialty centers. Integrating pain management into primary care could take the form of embedded psychiatric and physical therapy services within primary care centers.7 The specialty pain center could also be integrated by offering patients with complex pain management needs joint evaluations by a pain specialist, psychiatrist, and physical therapist during longer visits.8 Integrating chronic pain management into primary care, following the model of behavioral health integration efforts by UCSF Health and other health systems, could yield substantial benefits, but it requires significant investments of money and time, as well as culture shifts, in order to alter provider approaches to chronic pain. 

Opioid Utilization

Opioid prescribing patterns are being increasingly scrutinized in the setting of the US opioid epidemic, and specialized pain centers have an opportunity to shape application of the newly released CDC opioid guidelines.Pain centers can lead their institutions toward adopting responsible forward-thinking opioid prescribing policies and press other departments to think critically about chronic pain management. More broadly, pain centers can serve as advocates for individuals struggling with opioid addiction and explore novel strategies to decrease opioid usage. 

Research

More research into alternative approaches to manage and treat chronic pain and the impact of treatment on healthcare utilization is needed to guide future interventions. During the transition from FFS to ACO models, there will likely be the need to develop improved short-term FFS payment models for comprehensive pain management. No single strategy has been shown to effectively and reproducibly treat chronic pain, making ongoing research of paramount importance.

It is important to acknowledge the obstacles preventing change in chronic pain management. The proposed changes are focused at the system level, requiring changes in culture, infrastructure, and care patterns. 
As many health systems across the country take on financial risk for the total cost of care for specific populations, it may be time to take a closer look at chronic pain. With chronic pain increasingly recognized as a disease, we hope that it will be addressed with preventive measures that focus on nonmedication and noninterventional approaches to pain management, including rehabilitation, pain psychology, and several modalities of complementary and integrative medicine.

It may be the perfect time to make systematic changes to how we deliver care to patients with chronic pain. Systems that take the lead in such changes will improve care for people with chronic pain, help better control the opioid crisis, and control costs in the setting of alternative payment mechanisms. Well-designed interventions to help provide coordinated effective care for patients with chronic pain could truly improve the value of care delivered at the population level.


Read more and download the PDF here