FAQ

Onboarding

State and Federal Policies

Cost

• Interested providers can begin the subscription process by completing a short survey.

Please access the survey at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/8T87FTX

To watch a short video on how to complete the HealthChoice Illinois ADT Survey:

• Onboarding packages will be sent to those providers who complete the survey

The onboarding packet requires the facility to complete a Discovery Form.  This helps the vendor (PointClickCare, formerly known as Collective Medical Technologies) to gather important information for implementation and clinical user onboarding.

To watch a short video on how to complete the HealthChoice Illinois ADT Discovery Form:

​The onboarding packet will be provided to the contact referenced in the IHA survey. Providers may also request this information by contacting HFS directly at HFS.HealthChoiceIllinoisADT@illinois.gov​. The Onboarding Packet includes:

The vendor has integrated with over three dozen different EHR platforms. HFS has extensively vetted the vendor's capabilites, and has full confidence that it will be able to work with most major EHRs for integration. A list of common EHR's with which the vendor has connected is provided.

HFS’ priority is getting all Illinois hospitals onboarded to the HealthChoice Illinois ADT platform as quickly as possible. Through the onboarding process, HFS is giving the hospitals the technical specifications to connect, and our vendor, Collective Medical, is willing to work with other technology vendors to accomplish this task. The decision on how to connect to the HealthChoice Illinois ADT platform is going to be made by each hospital, based on its considerations of cost, efficiency and speed in relation to the technical specifications.

The Collective platform uses a customary set of demographic data points to positively identify patients. Its algorithms have been developed in house and are based on years of experience and best practice. There are many nuances to the solution, though the basic data items include: MRN, SSN, DOB, Name, Phone Number and Address:  

• ​​ MRN: A patient’s MRN (Medical Record Number), coupled with a unique assigning authority, is by far the most accurate way of identifying patients. Patients may have several MRNs even within a single facility.
• SSN & DOB: SSN and DOB combinations are a tried-and-true method for identifying patients. CMT takes special precaution in handling SSNs, due to their sensitive nature. SSNs are NEVER stored in the EDIE (Emergency Department Information Exchange) database in plain text. When received, the Collective platform salts and encrypts all SSNs, and removes them from all archived messages. Doing this enables EDIE to use SSNs to match patients, but will never reveal SSNs to users, even in the event of a breach.
  
• Patient Name, DOB, Address & Phone: A combination of a patient’s name, DOB, and address or phone number, will also yield a match when an SSN or MRN are unavailable.
  
• Patient First Name, DOB, & Insurance Policy Number: Selected insurers may be eligible to use policy number to supplement demographic matching. 
  

It is important that a facility provide all of these data items as available in order to ensure the highest possible match accuracy. In particular, Collective safeguards Social Security Numbers with additional precaution. Social Security Numbers are never stored in their original form and are instead passed through a salt-and-hash encryption process that provides an irreversible hash value. During the matching process, incoming SSNs are salted and hashed in the same manner so as to yield the correct hash if the patient is a match. The plain text SSN is immediately discarded from memory. Please make every effort to provide patient SSN and all other fields to allow for the best possible matching results with patients in Collective's data models.

Although the Collective platform merging algorithm is accurate to a very high degree, every so often—generally due to fraud, mis-clicks (such as selecting the wrong gender in a drop down), registrar typos, and other mistakes—patients can be accidentally merged together. When this occurs, Collective maintains careful accounting of the origin, date, and time, as well as the method of creation for each piece of data stored within the platform. This enables meticulous auditing of data and also allows for precise unmerging when a mis-merge is detected by a client or by the system (more likely). If a mis-merge is identified by a user at your facility, your assigned Application Specialist at Collective will review and unmerge the record. 

Patient Matching is a critical component of the vendor's platform. The system used by Collective is built and maintained in-house, has been extensively vetted by hundreds of Hospitals, Health Plans and Clinics across the country, and has processed over billions of transactions spanning nearly 500M patient encounters for ~90M patients with high accuracy (low false positive, low false negative) levels. Below is a high-level overview of the process; for additional details, please contact the Collective Hospital Onboarding Team. 

If your facility is highlighted orange and is marked with an "X" for sending live data on the HealthChoice Illinois ADT Particiant's List the HL7 messages being sent to the portal may have the wrong NPI, Name, or Address.  HFS does not count your facility as compliant unless the National Provider Identifier is correct and the Facility Name and address matches what is approved and registered in IMPACT.  This standard is mandated by HIPAA and published in the NPI Final Rule.  CMT requires you to complete a ticket to correct this information.  Please email support@collectivemedicaltech.com or call 801-285-0770 and provide the following information.  Once a ticket is established please send this information with the below chart to HFS.HealthChoiceIllinoisADT@Illinois.gov . 

• All Illinois hospitals that serve Medicaid customers will connect as data contributors and will also receive encounter notifications.
• Skilled Nursing Facilities (SNFs), Supportive Living Facilities, ICFDDs and SMHRFs with existing ADT/HL7 capabilities will also connect.​
  

• Managed Care Organizations (MCOs) will provide member panels in addition to receiving encounter notifications.

• Other providers serving Medicaid customers may connect and subscribe. 

• ​The original requirement to connect can be found in the hospital Provider Notice Launch of HFS Statewide Technology Platform and states that "All hospitals that are enrolled in the IMPACT system to serve Medicaid participants will be required to transmit electronic notifications of admissions, discharges, and transfers for Medicaid participants in an HL7 format to the HFS technology platform by September 30, 2021." 

•  The Federal Register references ADT requirements on pages 25586-25603 including the statement “We proposed to revise the CoPs for Medicare- and Medicaid-participating hospitals at 42 CFR 482.24 by adding a new standard at paragraph (d), ‘‘Electronic Notifications,’’ that would require hospitals to send electronic patient event notifications of a patient’s admission, discharge, and/or transfer to another health care facility or to another community provider or practitioner.” 

•  Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) helpful links:
  

1. ​​​​​Interoperability and Patient Access Website: https://www.cms.gov/Regulations-and-Guidance/Guidance/Interoperability/index
2. Final Rule (PDF): https://www.cms.gov/files/document/cms-9115-f.pdf
3. ​Federal Register:https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2020-05-01/pdf/2020-05050.pdf   (ADT referenced on pages 25586-25603)
4. ​Fact Sheet: https://www.cms.gov/newsroom/fact-sheets/interoperability-and-patient-access-fact-sheet
1. ​Additional Links:
2. https://www.cms.gov/files/document/interoperability-and-patient-access-final-rule-presentation.pdf 

The cost of the software, licensing and support for connecting to the HealthChoice Illinois ADT system is fully covered by HFS and is offered at no cost to the provider for all patients, regardless of patient insurance / line of business.   

For providers who are pursuing purchase, installation and configuration of HL7 connections for the first time to comply with the requirements, HFS is making funding available to cover reasonable costs. Since the amounts must be budgeted, funding is not limitless, though HFS will do its best to assist providers with these costs.    

HFS had a limited amount of funds available to reimburse hospitals for allowable expenses through September 30, 2021. HFS intends to request federal approval for future funding to help offset provider costs to connect to the HealthChoice Illinois ADT platform. Additional information about the provider eligibility for such funding and allowable expenses will be posted if and when the funding is approved.

HFS had a limited amount of funds available to reimburse Long-Term Care facilities for allowable expenses through September 30, 2021. HFS intends to request federal approval for future funding to help offset provider costs to connect to the HealthChoice Illinois ADT platform. Additional information about the provider eligibility for such funding and allowable expenses will be posted if and when the funding is approved

The cost of subscribing to the ADT notification service, allowing Medicaid providers to have access to admission, discharge and transfer data for their patients, is fully covered by HFS and is offered at no cost to the provider.