Have you ever tallied up the time you spend filling out different credentialing applications for the health care organizations you work with?
Would you like to submit one application for all groups using a given database?
Well, start the celebration -- the AAFP Board of Directors recently voted to endorse the Universal Credentialing DataSource, operated by the Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare. The Academy is the first medical professional organization to support this secure, national provider credentialing database system.
Go to the CAQH Web site at https://caqh.geoaccess.com/oas/ and click on "Launch Schedule" for a list of participating health plans. If you work with any plan on the list, you should have received a provider ID number in the mail. However, if you need an ID number, call the health plan and ask its staff to submit your name to CAQH immediately. You will receive a postcard with your number from CAQH. For faster service, confirm your name has been submitted.Within a week, call CAQH at (888) 599-1771 and retrieve your ID number over the phone.
Now you're ready to register. With your ID number in hand, go to the CAQH Web site at http://www.caqh.org and click on "Universal Credentialing DataSource," then "Providers Enter Here." It takes about two hours to enroll.You will submit a single application to a central database that is accessible to all of the participating health plans and networks.
Here's more great news: Physicians participate for free.
You can update your information online or by fax at any time. Once each quarter, you must confirm that your information in the database is correct.
The database will be available nationwide by the end of 2004. These states are not yet participating: Massachusetts, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon, Arkansas and Utah. Michigan will come on board June 1. Medicare and Medicaid are not involved in the initiative.
To reach writer Sheri Porter, e-mail sporter@aafp.org.
FP Report is published by the AAFP
News Department.
Copyright © 2004 by American Academy of Family Physicians.