AHA selling do-it-yourself hospital compliance kit
Workbook, video, and Web site offer assistance
Not every hospital has the financial resources to put together a formal compliance plan, but every hospital should have one in place, the Chicago-based American Hospital Association (AHA) says.
To help hospitals voluntarily put a compliance plan in place, the AHA, in conjunction with consultants Coopers & Lybrand, LLP’s National Health Care Regulatory Practice, now offers a sort of do-it-yourself kit.
"This service is one way to help [hospitals] put in place the safeguards and processes for navigating successfully through the payment system. Complying with a system as complicated as Medicare can result in honest mistakes, not intentional fraud," AHA President Dick Davidson said in a statement.
"The compliance package is being made available at a time when the federal government has changed its approach to compliance, now presuming that every hospital billing error is a fraudulent claim."
The Health Care Compliance Service offers the following tools as part of a complete do-it-yourself compliance program:
• Framework for Compliance guide and video.
The guide and video focus on the importance of adopting consistent standards within the framework of a compliance plan.
• Compliance manual/workbook.
The workbook contains checklists, assessment tools, and step-by-step action items to guide users through all phases of the compliance plan project.
• Information help line.
The toll free phone line offers a team of national compliance experts to answer subscribers’ questions.
• Compliance Web site.
Located on the AHA’s own Web site, www.aha.org, the site offers access to time- sensitive information about compliance issues.
• Optional consulting support.
Coopers & Lybrand consultants will be available to subscribers who select this part of the service.
Service is based on OIG draft
The AHA compliance service, marketed under the association’s subsidiary, AHA Insurance Resource, was created based on the information contained in the draft version of the Department of Health and Human Service’s Office of the Inspector General’s Model Compliance Plan for Hospitals, the final version of which is due out this month.
Framework for Compliance guide and video are free, says AHA spokesperson Dione Dougal. There are two options for subscribing to the service, which includes the manual/workbook and access to the help line and the Web site.
Option one is available for a one-time fee of $3,500 for AHA members ($7,000 for non-members). Under this option, each additional copy of the manual/workbook costs $350 for members ($700 for nonmembers). Subsequent annual subscriptions to the service cost $500 for AHA members ($1,000 for non-members).
Option two requires a three-year commitment of $1,500 per year for members ($2,500 for nonmembers). After the third year, annual subscription cost is the same as option one.
For more information, call (800) 242-4677. To subscribe to the AHA Health Care Compliance Service, call (800) AHA-2626.
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