[nurseT]

Our State Dept of Corrections privatized and hired CMS from out of state. CMS will not reimburse county jail for DOC inmate medical expenses, but wants the provider: dentist/ ER/ pharmacy to bill CMS directly for reimbursement. They gave our billing dept an instruction letter with phone numbers and codes etc.to give to the providers to file for reimbursement. Guess what? Ive been told by my providers that The codes don't work, and no one answers the phone numbers provided. Or if they do answer, the person answering does not know what to tell the provider to do. What is up with that? Everybody up in the office keeps coming to me with this problem. I don't know what to tell them, I don't do billing. But my only solution was to send all DOC sentenced inmates with medical problems right to DOC. Even if all they take is an antacid. Anyone know how this billing thing works or why there is such a problem?