Hospitals must notify naviHealth before transferring Medicare Advantage members to SNFs

As communicated previously, we waived the requirement to obtain clinical review for the first three days of skilled nursing facility stays for Medicare Plus BlueSM PPO and BCN AdvantageSM members transferred from acute care hospitals. This is in effect for transfers that take place from April 3 through May 31, 2020.

Hospitals are still obligated to notify naviHealth about transfers.

However, we're finding that some hospitals are transferring our Medicare Advantage members to SNFs without notifying naviHealth.

To avoid problems, we're clarifying what you need to do:

We're asking SNFs to confirm that naviHealth has received the required notification for each member before they accept the transfer. Once naviHealth receives the notification, they'll provide a three-day authorization to transfer the patient to the SNF.

Failure to notify naviHealth means there's no authorization in our system when we receive the claim from the SNF.

We'll update the COVID-19 utilization management changes document with the details about the information you must send when notifying naviHealth.

Posted: April 2020
Lines of business: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan and Blue Care Network