Kidney Acquisitions

[Guest guest]

Hi, my name is Angie Starcher and I am the financial coordinator for

the transplant department at ton Area Medical Center in

ton, West Virginia. I am trying to find out how the kidney

acquisition process works for other transplant centers.

Here is our process:

All of the bills are reviewed by the pre-transplant coordinators to

make sure that it is a test they have ordered. I then write a check

request which has to be signed by my nurse manager and assistant

administrator. I then have to remove all patient identifiers (with a

magic marker!)except the account number before I can send it to our

accounting department for a check to be cut. They store these as our

final copy. Our accounting department has been mandating us to

remove any patient identifiers from these itemized statements and

they state HIPAA Guidelines as their reason. My concern is that the

Medicare guidelines say that certain information has to be on these

statements, such as name, address, ssn, and if a donor, the

recipients information. Since we are within the same institution and

all follow the same HIPAA guidelines, they have a need to know basis

and if we are audited, the could create an issue.

I would appreciate any input with this situation that you have to

give. Thank You.

Angie