PREPROPOSAL STATEMENT OF INQUIRY
Subject of Possible Rule Making: Chapter 246-455 WAC, Hospital patient discharge information reporting.
Statutes Authorizing the Agency to Adopt Rules on this Subject: RCW 43.70.040.
Reasons Why Rules on this Subject may be Needed and What They Might Accomplish: The existing rule will not meet the current and future requirements of discharge data use. The rule needs to be changed to reflect changes in the data quality requirements and timing of data submission. Data quality will be viewed in the aggregate with an error rate not to exceed 1.0% rather than a 95% accuracy level for only discharges and total charges. This will not be a major impact since very few hospitals exceed this level and statewide error rates are fairly constant at .03%. Electronic submission of data and online data correction eliminates the need for mail processing time, currently 6-7 days. This reduces the correction process from 14 days to 7 days, but does not impact the actual amount of hospital processing time. The rule also needs to respond to current and pending Federal UB92/Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) (formerly Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA)) reporting requirements.
Other Federal and State Agencies that Regulate this Subject and the Process Coordinating the Rule with These Agencies: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and National Uniform Billing Committee (NUBC).
Process for Developing New Rule: Negotiated rule making.
Interested parties can participate in the decision to adopt the new rule and formulation of the proposed rule before publication.
(1) Jeannette Neibert, CHARS Manager, Department of Health, P.O. Box 47811, Olympia, WA 98504-7811, phone (360) 236-4223, fax (360) 664-8579, e-mail jeannette.neibert@DOH.WA.GOV.
(2) Bill Mackey, CHARS Project Director, Department of Health, P.O. Box 47811, Olympia, WA 98504-7811, phone (360) 236-4222, fax (360) 664-8579, e-mail william.mackey@DOH.WA.GOV.
(3) Advance meetings with stakeholders.
(4) Information posted to WEB.
(5) Information placed in CHARS newsletter.
(6) Mailings to key constituents.
(7) Public WAC hearing.
August 26, 2002
M. C. Selecky
Secretary