FAIR Health Selected to Help Colorado Update Its Workers' Compensation Fee Schedule

A New Collaboration between FAIR Health and the Colorado Division of Workers' Compensation

News provided by

Apr 15, 2019, 06:33 ET

NEW YORK, April 15, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Following a competitive bidding process, the State of Colorado selected FAIR Health to provide its expertise and data resources to aid in analyzing, revising and updating Colorado's workers' compensation fee schedule. FAIR Health, a national, independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing transparency to healthcare costs and health insurance information, will work closely with the Division of Workers' Compensation to update the Colorado Workers' Compensation Medical Fee Schedule, including values for medical, anesthesia, transportation, HCPCS and dental procedures.

The new contract marks the first time FAIR Health will be supporting Colorado in updating its workers' compensation fee schedule. In addition to helping to assure that the fee schedule remains current, comprehensive and geographically relevant, FAIR Health will participate in meetings to gather feedback from stakeholders. While using data from the State of Colorado, FAIR Health will use its own healthcare database for comparative analysis and benchmarking.

FAIR Health President Robin Gelburd stated: "We look forward to assisting the State of Colorado and the Division of Workers' Compensation in their efforts to update and maintain a fee schedule that pertains to the state's specific needs. In our experience, state fee schedules benefit greatly from addressing the specific needs of the state and utilizing data that have been validated by an independent, neutral organization such as FAIR Health in order to accommodate all stakeholders, including injured workers."

FAIR Health's experienced team is already working with a number of other states to develop or support their workers' compensation fee schedules through data and services to address states' varying needs. For instance, FAIR Health has been assisting Georgia and Kentucky for many years to update their fee schedules and is currently assisting the Mississippi Workers' Compensation Commission with their 2019 fee schedule, which will be released later this year. FAIR Health data are not only the basis for fee schedules in some states, but also serve as a primary data source in many states for private companies that process workers' compensation claims in the absence of a state fee schedule or when a procedure is not valued in a state's fee schedule. In addition, FAIR Health data are referenced in statutes, regulations and official memoranda around the country as the designated source of cost information for a variety of other state health-related programs.

About FAIR Health
FAIR Health is a national, independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing transparency to healthcare costs and health insurance information through data products, consumer resources and health systems research support. FAIR Health possesses the nation's largest collection of private healthcare claims data, which includes over 28 billion claim records contributed by payors and administrators who insure or process claims for private insurance plans covering more than 150 million individuals. FAIR Health licenses its privately billed data and data products—including benchmark modules, data visualizations, custom analytics, episodes of care analytics and market indices—to commercial insurers and self-insurers, employers, providers, hospitals and healthcare systems, government agencies, researchers and others. Certified by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) as a national Qualified Entity, FAIR Health also receives data representing the experience of all individuals enrolled in traditional Medicare Parts A, B and D; FAIR Health houses data on Medicare Advantage enrollees in its private claims data repository. FAIR Health can produce insightful analytic reports and data products based on combined Medicare and commercial claims data for government, providers, payors and other authorized users. FAIR Health has earned HITRUST CSF and Service Organization Controls (SOC 2) certifications by meeting the rigorous data security requirements of these standards. As a testament to the reliability and objectivity of FAIR Health data, the data have been incorporated in statutes and regulations around the country and designated as the official, neutral data source for a variety of state health programs, including workers' compensation and personal injury protection (PIP) programs. FAIR Health data serve as an official reference point in support of certain state balance billing laws that protect consumers against bills for surprise out-of-network and emergency services. FAIR Health also uses its database to power a free consumer website available in English and Spanish and an English/Spanish mobile app, which enable consumers to estimate and plan for their healthcare expenditures and offer a rich educational platform on health insurance. The website has been honored by the White House Summit on Smart Disclosure, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), URAC, the eHealthcare Leadership Awards, appPicker, Employee Benefit News and Kiplinger's Personal Finance. FAIR Health also is named a top resource for patients in Elisabeth Rosenthal's book, An American Sickness: How Healthcare Became Big Business and How You Can Take It Back. For more information on FAIR Health, visit fairhealth.org.

Contact:
Dean Sicoli
Executive Director of Communications and Government Relations
FAIR Health
646-664-1645
[email protected]

SOURCE FAIR Health