Claims Processing

Senators Hawley and Blumenthal asked UnitedHealth Group how Change Healthcare's systems were breached, why the clearinghouse suffered "such an egregious and unexplained outage" and the extent of data compromised in the ransomware attack.

The agency says threat actors are targeting organizations' IT help desks with phone calls from a local area code claiming to be revenue cycle or administrator employees. After gaining access, they divert legitimate payments.

Washington, Maryland and New Mexico have leveraged funding opportunities and regulatory tools to ease the burden on providers still struggling to operate with claims payments disrupted.

Also: Availity clarifies reports that it has cut ties with the clearinghouse and says it "fully expects" to reconnect to Change Healthcare.

The provider saw a 22% decrease in one type of denial and an 18% decrease in another. Those improvements have resulted in more than 30 hours per week in eliminated work for follow-up staff.

Meanwhile, the American Hospital Association is calling on Congress to do more in the face of a "staggering loss of revenue" for health systems.