Home Health & Hospice Week

NOE, NOA problems loom.

Get ready for more work if any of your payments are linked to Change Healthcare.

At press time, the vendor’s widely reported outage caused by a cyberattack was exceeding the one-week threshold.

“The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and National Government Services Inc. (NGS) are aware that Change Healthcare recently suffered a cyber-attack,” HHH Medicare Administrative Contractor NGS reports on its website. “Change Healthcare is a clearinghouse vendor that connects providers with insurance payers and has operations that impact the submission of Medicare claims, including NGS,”the MAC explains.

Good news: “At this time, there is no indication that NGS’ systems have been compromised. This is not a CMS or NGS incident,” the MAC continues. “We know you are working hard to make sure your patients have continued access to care and this matter is very concerning. We are gathering more information as the situation unfolds, assessing all options, and will provide updates when they become available.”

Do this: “If your Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) clearinghouse is impacted, we recommend you check with them for further instructions,” NGS advises.

Home health and hospice agencies should prepare “to request exceptions for the late submission of a Notice of Admission” and a Notice of Election, respectively, trade group LeadingAge counsels on its website.

Consider this: “Medicare Part A Providers can use FISS DDE (Direct Data Entry) for Part A claim entry,” NGS offers. “This is a free option, and the provider may already use FISS DDE.”

However: “Please note, FISS DDE does not offer batch claim submission. Claims must be submitted one at a time,” NGS points out.

Change Healthcare is owned by UnitedHealth Group. The cyberattack has been claimed by Russian ransomware group Blackcat, which the feds had claimed to defeat this past December, according to press reports.