DecisionHealth’s Board of Medical Specialty Coding & Compliance Announces New Home Care Clinical Specialist-OASIS (HCS-O) Certification
The Board of Medical Specialty Coding & Compliance (BMSC) launches new professional certification in OASIS-C for home health clinicians assuring home health agencies that their clinicians are able to conduct a comprehensive patient assessment and accurately complete the OASIS-C form.
Washington, DC, April 18, 2011 --(PR.com)-- The Board of Medical Specialty Coding & Compliance (BMSC) now offers a professional certification in OASIS-C for home health clinicians. The new HCS-O certification assures home health agencies that clinicians are able to conduct a comprehensive patient assessment and accurately complete the OASIS-C form. This leads to improved outcomes, accurate claims submission, and prompt and proper claims payment.
The Home Care Clinical Specialist-OASIS certification is issued by the same accrediting body that created the gold standard in home health coding certification: the Home Care Coding Specialist-Diagnosis (HCS-D).
The new HCS-O designation is granted only to clinicians who have demonstrated mastery of the clinical skills and judgment necessary to assess a patient’s condition correctly, and the knowledge to complete an OASIS-C assessment form accurately. Clinicians with HCS-O certification also know to document medical necessity, make connections between OASIS-C, documentation and coding, and measure and report outcomes.
“We’re very excited to bring this new credential to home health clinicians looking to demonstrate their OASIS-C proficiency,” says Corinne Kuypers-Denlinger, Vice President of DecisionHealth. “It’s a win-win for them and their agencies, which are looking to ensure excellence in patient care through the highest levels of OASIS-C assessment capabilities.”
The HCS-O examination is based on the following areas of competency: 1) Standard conventions and how OASIS works with payment systems; 2) Clinical case-mix items; 3) Wounds case-mix items; 4) Functional case-mix items; 5) Diagnosis coding rules; and, 6) Process measures (screening questions).
Agencies familiar with the OASIS-C certifications from other organizations will find the HCS-O exam from the Board of Medical Specialty Coding more rigorous. Exams cover more than just basic CMS guidelines to include application of that knowledge to the kind of complex, multi-faceted assessments and plans of care scenarios that clinicians regularly encounter in the field. Also, the credential maintenance cycle requires clinicians keep skills up-to-date through annual renewal or recertification.
Not only does the new HCS-O certification hold to higher standards, but it also is more cost-effective than less rigorous certifications. Comparisons will show that BMSC offers favorable pricing for first attempts on the test, as well as complementary second chances for those who fail to qualify on the first effort.
Finally, clinicians preparing to take the HCS-O exam will find a wealth of resources available through a partnership with DecisionHealth to provide the following resources, including:
The BMSC Study Guide for HCS-O Certification Examination 2011 shows clinicians which OASIS-C competencies they need to focus on as they prepare for the HCS-O certification exam. Authored by the experts who wrote the exam, the study guide contains important OASIS assessment tips, practice questions and an exam outline.
The OASIS-C Practice & Answer Book contains more than 100 real-life home health patient scenarios covering every item on the OASIS-C form. It’s an indispensable guide for understanding how to complete OASIS-C assessments accurately.
The OASIS-C Case-Mix Library is a set of 5 self-paced online courses from which clinicians can pick and choose as needed. From basic OASIS-C introduction to advanced wound case mix details, this library helps clinicians with in-depth instruction on any OASIS-C case-mix challenge they have.
These and more than a dozen other supporting products can be found in the DecisionHealth store at www.decisionhealth.com/store by entering “OASIS-C” in the keyword search box.
About Decision Health
DecisionHealth (www.decisionhealth.com), a division of UCG, publishes information services for the home health care, physician office and hospital provider marketplaces. Its more than 35 newsletters, including marketplace leaders Home Health Line and Part B News, as well as hundreds of annual live and web-based professional seminars, cover challenges as wide ranging as Medicare coding and reimbursement, Joint Commission accreditation, benchmarks and payment, and compliance with health care fraud and abuse and HIPAA laws. DecisionHealth also publishes ICD, CPT® and HCPCS code books, as well as solutions-based and referential web site portals and desk-top applications.
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The Home Care Clinical Specialist-OASIS certification is issued by the same accrediting body that created the gold standard in home health coding certification: the Home Care Coding Specialist-Diagnosis (HCS-D).
The new HCS-O designation is granted only to clinicians who have demonstrated mastery of the clinical skills and judgment necessary to assess a patient’s condition correctly, and the knowledge to complete an OASIS-C assessment form accurately. Clinicians with HCS-O certification also know to document medical necessity, make connections between OASIS-C, documentation and coding, and measure and report outcomes.
“We’re very excited to bring this new credential to home health clinicians looking to demonstrate their OASIS-C proficiency,” says Corinne Kuypers-Denlinger, Vice President of DecisionHealth. “It’s a win-win for them and their agencies, which are looking to ensure excellence in patient care through the highest levels of OASIS-C assessment capabilities.”
The HCS-O examination is based on the following areas of competency: 1) Standard conventions and how OASIS works with payment systems; 2) Clinical case-mix items; 3) Wounds case-mix items; 4) Functional case-mix items; 5) Diagnosis coding rules; and, 6) Process measures (screening questions).
Agencies familiar with the OASIS-C certifications from other organizations will find the HCS-O exam from the Board of Medical Specialty Coding more rigorous. Exams cover more than just basic CMS guidelines to include application of that knowledge to the kind of complex, multi-faceted assessments and plans of care scenarios that clinicians regularly encounter in the field. Also, the credential maintenance cycle requires clinicians keep skills up-to-date through annual renewal or recertification.
Not only does the new HCS-O certification hold to higher standards, but it also is more cost-effective than less rigorous certifications. Comparisons will show that BMSC offers favorable pricing for first attempts on the test, as well as complementary second chances for those who fail to qualify on the first effort.
Finally, clinicians preparing to take the HCS-O exam will find a wealth of resources available through a partnership with DecisionHealth to provide the following resources, including:
The BMSC Study Guide for HCS-O Certification Examination 2011 shows clinicians which OASIS-C competencies they need to focus on as they prepare for the HCS-O certification exam. Authored by the experts who wrote the exam, the study guide contains important OASIS assessment tips, practice questions and an exam outline.
The OASIS-C Practice & Answer Book contains more than 100 real-life home health patient scenarios covering every item on the OASIS-C form. It’s an indispensable guide for understanding how to complete OASIS-C assessments accurately.
The OASIS-C Case-Mix Library is a set of 5 self-paced online courses from which clinicians can pick and choose as needed. From basic OASIS-C introduction to advanced wound case mix details, this library helps clinicians with in-depth instruction on any OASIS-C case-mix challenge they have.
These and more than a dozen other supporting products can be found in the DecisionHealth store at www.decisionhealth.com/store by entering “OASIS-C” in the keyword search box.
About Decision Health
DecisionHealth (www.decisionhealth.com), a division of UCG, publishes information services for the home health care, physician office and hospital provider marketplaces. Its more than 35 newsletters, including marketplace leaders Home Health Line and Part B News, as well as hundreds of annual live and web-based professional seminars, cover challenges as wide ranging as Medicare coding and reimbursement, Joint Commission accreditation, benchmarks and payment, and compliance with health care fraud and abuse and HIPAA laws. DecisionHealth also publishes ICD, CPT® and HCPCS code books, as well as solutions-based and referential web site portals and desk-top applications.
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Contact
DecisionHealth
Tiffany Jones
1-301-287-2283
www.decisionhealth.com
http://www.decisionhealth.com
Tiffany Jones
1-301-287-2283
www.decisionhealth.com
http://www.decisionhealth.com
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