Provider Outreach and Education Advisory Group (POEAG) Meeting Minutes - July 19, 2023

Attendees

Members: Kimberly Hanson, Erica Rochelle, Sharee Hummer, Dawn Jorgensen, Jan Palmer, Heather Werner, Yvette Nugent, Kimberlie Rogers-Bowers, Bill Noyes, Marsha Lawrence, Tina Padden, Wayne Bradberry, Tanya Ward, Lesleigh Sisson, Rose Gomez, Maria Sanchez, Dr. Kesselman, Maria Koehnlein, Randy Stevens, Crissy Hill, Catherine Hamilton, Kelly Troutman, Pam Fritz, Mindy Eberhart, Celeste Lane, Jeannette Leon, Carolyn Koster, Barb Stockert

Noridian: Amber Mertz; Ashley Decoteau; Cindy White; Colleen Harryman; Kate Petersen; Kelsey Slettebak; Kloe Roberts; Mary Reineke-Ferguson; Melissa Betts; Ruth Reese; Shelly Carlson; Stacy Dahl; Tanya Gillies; Tracy Schutt

POE Advisory Group Mission and Goals

Mission

  • To determine the best methods of providing quality education and training to our supplier community.

Goals

Standing Agenda Items

Follow-up from Previous Meeting

General

  • Joint POEAG to develop education for clinicians ordering DMEPOS
    • Six meetings have been held focusing on sleep
      • Great suggestions being worked on
        • Provide education during residency
        • More webinars for providers on DME requirements
        • Update clinician checklist
      • Newsletter
  • Collaborative MAC education
    • Surgical Dressings
      • August 2023
    • Positive Airway Pressure (PAP)
      • Fall 2023
    • Therapeutic Shoes for Persons with Diabetes
      • December 2023
  • Level 200 webinars
    • Please send scenarios you would like to see included
    • Member Question: Does this apply for all product categories, like lower limb prosthetics?
      • Yes, all product categories are welcome

DME

  • Additional Education on JZ modifier for single dose vial drugs
    • External infusion pumps webinars
      • Part 1 July 25, 2023, at 1 p.m. CT
      • Part 2 July 26, 2023, at 1 p.m. CT
  • Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM)
    • G7 monitor added to chart on CGM Noridian webpage

O&P

  • Lower Limb Prosthetics (LLPs) level 200 webinar
    • Education is working on this

New Items

General

  • Ask the Contractor Meeting (ACM)
    • Scheduled for 2023
      • August 10, 2023, 2 p.m. CT
    • General - all topics

DME

O&P

Noridian Questions to POE Advisory Members

  • What type of education is needed for the Noridian Medicare Portal (NMP)?
    • Other MAC portals have provided the ICD-10 linked to the HCPCS for same or similar or the code used by the previous supplier. Can Noridian offer this?
      • Noridian will pass this on to the portal team.
    • Can we see the previous supplier within the previous five years?
      • Yes, NMP provides the previous supplier under Option 1.
  • How does the supplier community hear about Noridian's webinar events and Monday Live Chat (MLC)?
    • Suggestion to go through associations to advertise and reach more people
      • How can Noridian better market these events to reach more of the supplier community?
        • The quarterly newsletter is very beneficial, and education could be passed on through this.
  • Could Noridian bring in-person seminars back and would there be attendance? How would we draw people, which locations? Prior to the pandemic, attendance was very low.
    • Member: CGS POE will be attending a congressional meeting with delegates from all over the country in November. Would Noridian be willing to attend as well? State meetings are also available, and they have had great attendance in the past couple of years.
      • Noridian will contact this member to obtain information for the November event.
        • Also, a reminder to please notify Noridian of events where DME MAC participation would be beneficial.
    • Member: Found that if people can get to an event location nonstop and if there's another attraction outside the meeting, they've had good attendance. The best attended has been Las Vegas and Phoenix, especially in cooler months for the rest of the country.
    • Member: Associations and larger conferences are starting to travel at management level again. Some suppliers are not sending people to local workshops due to budget and the fact that webinars work very well.
  • If Noridian Medical Directors attended, would this make a difference?
    • Members: Overwhelming yes
    • Member: Attended a workshop to gain contacts with other contractors, such as home health, pharma companies, and manufacturers.
    • Member: MDs are a bonus in getting to travel to in-person seminars. We are mostly investing time and travel into our digital health elements so mostly local travel for our company unless digital health related.
  • What are the group's thoughts on individual site visits?
    • Member: What would the agenda be? Preorganized or collaborative?
      • Noridian: Both, for example, if we want to educate on diabetic items at a clinic, we would look at data we have for billing errors related to practitioner documentation, services provided, show practitioners what documentation errors we saw, etc. Noridian would drive the reason for the visit and then see if there are questions, we could address.
    • Member: For large suppliers and national providers the onsite visits are very helpful if they are educational in nature to share data, top denials and provide education on those billing errors for process improvement.
    • Member: Depending on audience and purpose, for their company, billing staff is remote. They may need to bring staff into the main office.
    • Member: Agree many billing staff are remote but many bill for several different practitioners. Having Medical Directors from both A/B and DME would be an awesome experience.
      • Noridian will share this feedback.
    • Member: Our company is 95% offsite and national. Something to consider when planning the best city for a seminar is on the supplier's home base address or the site/area of a supplier. We literally have staff all over the US that are securely linked in.
    • Member: Our practice focus is on vision care and best place is Las Vegas to reach as many vision practitioners as possible. Willing to help coordinate.
      • Refractive Lenses SME at Noridian will reach out.

Suggestions from POE Advisory Members

  • Member: Working though a large system, letters are often re-routed and by the time it's received by the correct person, there doesn't leave much time to respond. How do I communicate who these should be sent to, or can we have more time to respond?
    • Noridian: The timelines are set by CMS, Noridian is unable to change those. Regarding Additional Documentation Request (ADR) letters, these may be directed to a position name rather than a person. That way the letter might have a better chance of always reaching whoever is in that position.
    • Member: The CERT hub is available to make updates to your contact information. The RAC portal also has an option within the portal to update contact information.
    • Member: Some feedback regarding the audit letters, we have experienced the same with mail being delayed. I contacted the contractor requesting the documents and have had good outcomes when requesting extensions.
  • Member: Do you do one-on-one training with statistics specific to the supplier?
    • Noridian: Targeted Probe & Educate (TPE) offers visits with statistics during audits suppliers should work with their TPE review nurse about specific education. POE provides general education during one-on-one visits. The request form is available on the Noridian website under Forms: Electronic Supplier Visit Data Collection Form.
  • Member: Suggestion for more education on spinal orthoses focused on the L1499 versus the existing code. Some suppliers are confused on the correct code to use.
    • Noridian: We will investigate how to better focus on this information during webinars.
  • Member: Is audio/video available for these meetings?
    • Noridian: The recording is not available; however the presentation will be emailed out following the meeting and the minutes will be added to the Noridian website.

Upcoming Meeting

Next Meeting: October 18, 2023, 12 p.m. CT/1 p.m. ET

 

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