Telehealth and Website Related Questions
This Spring, providers will have the opportunity to offer new information in the NCTracks provider application related to telehealth services. These additional fields bring NC Medicaid into compliance with recent amendments to the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023. The following questions will be added to the Services page of the provider application:
- “Do you offer telehealth services covered by Medicaid?”
- If the provider answers Yes to this question, the provider will be asked “What types of telehealth services do you offer?” and the provider may select all applicable responses from a list of options including Remote Patient Monitoring, Store and Forward, Telephone Conversations, and Virtual Portal Conversations.
- “Are in-person services available at this location?”
- “Do you have an internet website URL you would like to display in a provider directory?”
For detailed information about telehealth services covered by NC Medicaid, please see clinical coverage policy 1H, Telehealth, Virtual Communications and Remote Patient Monitoring on the Program Specific Clinical Coverage Policies webpage.
- Providers will have the option to apply their response to the telehealth-related question to all active locations within the provider record.
- Additionally, they will also be able to answer these questions and/or apply the same responses when new locations are added to existing records.
- If the same response does not apply to all active locations on the application, providers should elect to respond separately for each location.
- The response to the website question will automatically be applied to all locations.
Attestation - Individual Enrollment Types
A new attestation process wherein individual providers completing initial enrollment, re-enrollment, and reverification applications will attest that all information on the application is true, correct, and complete to the best of their knowledge and belief.
The office administrator (OA) can complete the application but will not be able to submit the application until it is verified, signed, and attested to by the individual provider through a secure link in a system-generated email. An email will be sent to the OA when the attestation is complete.
This will only apply to new applications submitted after implementation and will not impact inflight applications. More information will be forthcoming in future communications.
Race, Ethnicity and Languages Spoken
Individual provider enrollment applications will allow providers to self-identify their race, ethnicity, and spoken languages. Providers will be able to opt out of providing this information, if they choose.
Changes to Exclusion Sanction Questions
The current Exclusion Sanction Question N ("Does the enrolling provider have any medical, chemical dependency, or psychiatric conditions that might adversely affect your ability to practice medicine or surgery or to perform the essential functions of your position?") will be replaced and three questions created. These questions will be applicable to all individual provider application types.
Replacing Question N:
- Is the enrolling provider currently engaged in the illegal use of drugs?
- “Currently" means sufficiently recent to justify a reasonable belief that the use of drugs may have an ongoing impact on one's ability to practice medicine. It is not limited to the day of, or within a matter of days or weeks before the date of application, rather that it has occurred recently enough to indicate the individual is actively engaged in such conduct. "Illegal use of drugs" refers to drugs whose possession or distribution is unlawful under the Controlled Substances Act, 21 U.S.C. §812.22. It "does not include the use of a drug taken under supervision by a licensed health care professional, or other uses authorized by the Controlled Substances Act or other provision of Federal law." The term does include, however, the unlawful use of prescription-controlled substances.
New Questions:
- Does the enrolling provider use any chemical substances that would in any way impair or limit the ability to practice medicine and perform the functions of the job with reasonable skill and safety?
- Does the enrolling provider have any reason to believe that they would pose a risk to the safety or well-being of patients?
- Is the enrolling provider unable to perform the essential functions of a practitioner in the area of practice even with reasonable accommodation?
Contact
NCTracks Call Center: 800-688-6696
Provider Ombudsman: 866-304-7062