The Office of Inspector General will be focusing on emergency ALS ambulance transports according to a recent report documented by Chris Kelly.
In past years the OIG has almost always mentioned non-emergent ambulance transports in the work plan, usually specifically mentioning repetitive non-emergent transports of dialysis patients. But for 2017, there is no mention of dialysis patients, or non-emergent transports at all. Maybe that is because the new, and soon to be nation-wide, prior approval process of repetitive non-emergent transports is designed to rectify any issues with dialysis patients. But whatever the reason, this year, the focus is on ALS services. The only ambulance related piece of the OIG work plan says:
“Prior OIG work found that Medicare made inappropriate payments for advanced life support emergency transports. We will determine whether Medicare payments for ambulance services were made in accordance with Medicare requirements.”