Bill > H2018

This bill requires healthcare facilities, including hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, and outpatient facilities, to use their assigned National Provider Identification (NPI) number, which is a unique ten-digit identification number issued by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to healthcare providers, when billing all public and private payers for services. The bill also introduces the concept of a "Secondary Facility," which is a location of a hospital that is physically separate from its main licensed site (the "Facility of Primary Licensure") and meets certain criteria, such as being more than 500 yards away or having separate utility systems. These Secondary Facilities must obtain their own NPI and may need a separate license, with specific billing rate requirements and a need determination process, although existing Secondary Facilities are exempt from the need determination. The goal is to ensure transparency in billing practices by linking services to the specific location where they were rendered, and the Department of Health and the Attorney General's Office will be responsible for enforcing these provisions.