SUBSCRIBE TO CRITERIONS ALERTS WITH YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS

SUBSCRIBE TO CRITERIONS ALERTS WITH YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Despite Snow, Support Services Open

Our Support Services Departments will be open today. As is common during heavy snowfalls, a higher volume of calls to our Intake Department can be expected, resulting in some delays in getting through to us or to your questions.

We suggest the use of eTracks or to email us at support@criterions.com to submit your questions or to report your issues.

To learn more about the use of eTracks, click here

Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Avoid Proposed Medicare Penalties

Do you see Medicare patients?

The government has now ruled that, within the first 6 months of 2011, you must prescribe electronically or you will be penalized 1% of your TOTAL Medicare payments for 2012.

ePrescribing
Incentive:
• Calculated as a percentage of estimated total Medicare Part B Fee-For-Service Allowed Charges submitted by end of February, according to the following schedule:
Legislation:
The Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (MIPPA)

Why is ePrescribing particularly important in 2011?
In addition to increasing Medicare reimbursement by 1% in 2011, ePrescribing in 2011 prevents physicians from incurring the ePrescribing penalties (in the chart above) for 2012 and 2013 as follows:

- Providers who do not successfully ePrescribe on 10 Medicare encounters between January and June 2011 will be subject to a 1% reduction in 2012 Medicare rates.

- Providers who do not successfully ePrescribe on 25 Medicare encounters between January and December 2011 will be subject to a 1.5% reduction in 2013 Medicare rates

Criterion's eRx module will allow compliance for this requirement and prevent payment penalization. eRx costs are $35.00/month which includes all available carrier formularies, drug to drug interaction warnings and generic substitution suggestions. Call our Criterions Support Services Center to get started (please allow a couple weeks for implementation and training).