----- Original Message -----
From: "Mike Craig (HL7)" <mcraig@...>
Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 12:05 PM
Subject: Request for help revising Emergency Department AIS

Date: July 17, 2006
RE: Analysis Help Needed - Emergency Department (ED) Billing

Dear ED Services Attachment Stakeholder:

This is the final solicitation to participate in an industry outreach
for developing the Emergency Department Claims Attachment. The purpose
of this resolicitation is because the most recent solicitation did not
elicit nearly enough volunteer participants to fairly represent industry
consensus. If there is not a sufficient participation generated from
this re-solicitation, then the HL7 Attachment Special Interest Group
(ASIG) will decide whether to include the Emergency Department Claims
attachment type (as it currently stands) in the Claims Attachment Final
Rule or advise HHS not to name it as one of the attachments standards.

Several years ago HL7 convened a group of interested industry
stakeholders to define the appropriate content for use in this claims
attachment. This attachment was developed along with five others, and
was offered to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as the
standard electronic ED attachment for consideration as the HIPAA
standard. This standard attachment, once named in a Final Rule by HHS,
will be available for use by all health care entities that utilize
additional information to support a health care claim for ED services.
As with previous HIPAA transaction standards, health plans will be
required to support this standard if named in the Final Rule.

As part of HL7's official NPRM comment preparation process we were
advised by some HL7 members that the ED attachment was in need of
revisions and also that it may indeed not even be necessary for use in
the claims payment cycle. Based on HL7 member discussion and
recommendation, we submitted an NPRM comment to HHS indicating that we
need more time to analyze this attachment.

HL7 seeks industry stakeholders to assist in analyzing the ED attachment
in terms of its content (e.g. whether certain data are necessary for
claims adjudication, whether they should be required in all cases,
whether the data can only be reported once versus multiple times); as
well as assessing the need for this attachment at all. It is our hope
that individuals with these specific areas of expertise will support us
in this effort.

Because we will have a limited timeframe in which to conduct this
analysis and return our responses to HHS, we are attempting to organize
our subject - matter- specific teams now, and ask those who volunteer to
stand by until you are notified shortly before we begin convening the
meetings to review comments. Our best guess at the time of this writing
is that we could start convening this team sometime in mid - August.

Those individuals who volunteer to help will be contacted once we are
ready to begin analysis. We will provide some advance notice, but it may
only be a week to 10-days or so.

The attached information describes our work group protocols, past
accomplishments, current objectives, and desired time frames.

Contact our special HL7 claims attachments email address,
HL7NPRM@... by August 16, 2006 to become a participant in the HL7 ED
Attachment analysis and comment response team. We ask that you also
forward this request to your constituents, particularly if you are
involved in an "association" or "committee" type of organization.

Sincerely,

Bob Davis
Emergency Department Outreach Facilitator under contract with HL7

HL7 Attachment Special Interest Group (ASIG) Co Chairs:
Maria Ward, PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP
Wes Rishel, Gartner
Penny Sanchez, EDS
Mike Cassidy, Siemens