Self-Service Pulse: What You Need To Know This Week

As your MAC, National Government Services wants to provide you with a comprehensive source containing the most current information available for our self-service tools.

Contact Us

Do you need to contact NGS? If so, we have a listing of available phone numbers, inquiry forms and addresses on our website. On the top of every page of our website you can select Contact Us or from the Resources dropdown, select Contact Us for available contact information.

Hospice Information in NGSConnex

Did you know that NGSConnex will provide all Hospice Notice of Elections and Hospice Benefit Periods. The following information will be provided.

Notice of Election

• NOE – Start date of the beneficiary’s election to the hospice benefit.
• NOE Receipt Date – The NOE must be submitted to Medicare, and accepted within five calendar days of the date of election in order to be timely.
• NOE Revocation Date – A NOTR, also known by its type of bill - 8XB must be submitted to, and accepted within five calendar days after the hospice discharge or revocation, unless a final hospice claim has already been submitted.
• NOE Revocation Indicator
• NPI

Hospice Benefit Periods

• Start Date – reflects the start date of a beneficiary’s elected benefit period of hospice coverage.
• End Date – reflects the end date of a beneficiary’s elected benefit period of hospice coverage.
• DOEBA – Date of earliest billing activity for the benefit period of hospice coverage.
• DOLBA – Date of latest billing activity for the benefit period of hospice coverage.
• Days Used – number of days used for the benefit period of hospice coverage.
• NPI the NPI for the Hospice provider for the elected benefit period of hospice coverage.
• Benefit Period

We encourage you to review the NGSConnex User Guide to learn more about this functionality.

New NGS Medicare University: Achievements

From your Medicare University Dashboard, click on Achievements you’ve completed.

Every time you complete a CBT or self-report that you attended a webinar or live training, you earn badges and points. We even have a Leaderboard which is updated every hour for those with a competitive spirit!

Using the “Create a report” button, you can generate one of three different reports to export to your computer:

• Achievement Report
• External Learning Report
• Badges and Points Report

These reports can provide your full history in Medicare University, or a specific date range and can be exported in either a CSV (opened in a program such as Excel) or PDF format. Reports are a great way to keep track of your training!

NGSConnex: Overview, Access, Navigation and Eligibility Look Up

As we’ve communicated, beginning 11/18/2024, Beneficiary Eligibility information will not be offered on the IVR. This includes all beneficiary eligibility information that was obtained under Option 1, Eligibility.

If you’re using the IVR for eligibility today, don’t wait; learn NGSConnex now. Our CSRs aren’t permitted to share eligibility information because it’s available through NGSConnex. We’ve scheduled webinars that will provide an overview of NGSConnex, including how to register, navigate and look up beneficiary eligibility within the portal. There will be time allotted after the overview to answer your questions. You may register below, or via our Events page.

Note: Webinars are held in Eastern Time.

NGSConnex: Overview, Access, Navigation and Eligibility Look Up

Social Determinants of Health (Part 4)

To facilitate the identification of potential needs of the patient to better serve their healthcare needs CMS has adopted coverage for a Social Determinants of Health risk assessment.  This video will discuss the new coding and payment parameters for the service. We will also discuss how the service must be provided and how and what should be addressed for coverage.

Posted 10/28/2024