HHS announces pilot project on optimizing administrative simplification standards

The Department of Health and Human Services is seeking health plan and clearinghouse volunteers to participate in an HHS Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act administrative simplification optimization project pilot. Volunteers will undergo reviews of their transactions for compliance with adopted standards, code sets, unique identifiers and operating rules. Reviews will be conducted beginning January 2018. For those interested in volunteering for the project, contact HIPAAcomplaint@cms.hhs.gov. U.S. health care providers could save more than $7.9 billion annually and at least 1.1 million labor hours per week if commercial health plans fully adopted the seven national standards for electronic business transactions, according to the latest annual CAQH Index. Health plans could save an estimated $1.4 billion annually if the standards were fully adopted, the report adds.