The Secret Shopper program was conducted during the first quarter of 2016 at the request of the OAHHS’ board of trustees and in consultation with the Patient Friendly Billing Group. The goal was to assess statewide levels of patient friendly billing practices.
As part of the program, OAHHS contacted hospitals statewide and scored each response according to a set of Tier 1 standards, according to the report.
The OAHHS said 97 percent of Oregon hospitals committed to the Tier 1 standards when providing good faith estimates to self-pay and out-of-network patients. However, the program found that while the majority of Oregon’s hospitals are succeeding in meeting two or more individual elements of Tier 1 standards, only four calls — to three standalone hospitals and one system, or 11 percent — met the Tier 1 standards in full.
Bandon Western World states that the Tier 1 standards consist of good faith estimates, including all applicable disclaimers, provided to patients for healthcare services. To comply with the Tier 1 standards, hospital billing staff also needed to communicate the availability of financial assistance as well as the location of financial assistance information on the hospital’s website, according to the report. The hospital had three business days to provide all estimate information to the patient.
One of the hospitals that met the Tier 1 standards in full was Southern Coos Hospital & Health Center in Bandon. The report did not disclose the other three.
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