The Illinois Public Health Association (IPHA) is thrilled to debut a new online training series entitled Medical Coding and Billing for Public Health Services. This unique training series includes 16 online classes covering all aspects of medical coding and billing for public health services. The courses were designed and presented by Shefali Mookencherry, MPH, MSMIS, RHIA, CHPS, HCISPP, Adjunct Professor at Benedictine University’s College of Education and Health Services, Department of Public Health. She has extensive experience in HIPAA, healthcare IT/finance, Meaningful Use, medical billing, coding, contracting, credentialing, and revenue cycle management, including more than twenty years in the healthcare industry, with nine spent in senior management positions. She has conducted various contracting, credentialing, billing, coding, and HIPAA education, training, compliance assessments/analyses for various clients, including public health departments/associations, small physician practices, IT vendors, integrated delivery networks, and academic institutions.
These courses were developed as part of IPHA’s Immunization Billing Project and HIV Category B Third Party Billing Project. Both of these projects were funded by grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) through the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH). These courses are currently available on the University of Illinois at Chicago’s (UIC) Public Health Learning website: https://www.publichealthlearning.com/course/index.php?categoryid=42. The Public Health Learning website is provided by the UIC MidAmerica Center for Public Health Practice. A link to these classes is also available on the IPHA website at: https://ipha.com/news/post/3013/online-training-series-medical-coding-and-billing-for-public-health-services.
“We are very excited to be offering these courses because they are designed specifically for public health,” states IPHA Executive Director, Tom Hughes. “There are a lot of medical billing and coding training classes available, but very few focus specifically on billing for public health services. These courses fill a critical need that has been neglected for too long. They will be an excellent training resource for Illinois’ public health sector.”
IPHA would like to acknowledge and thank the CDC and IDPH for providing the funding that was used for the development of these classes and other valuable resources that have helped local public health departments build their capacity to bill third party payers, such as Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance. The funds that are recovered through billing enable local public health departments to sustain services that are vitally important to their communities, such as immunizations for children and adults, HIV testing, various types of health screenings, family planning services, and more.
For general information about the CDC’s Immunization Billables Project, please see: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/billables-project/index.html. For information about Illinois’ Immunization Billing Project, please see: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/programs/billables-project/success-stories.html#il.
For additional information about the Medical Coding and Billing for Public Health Services training courses, please visit the IPHA website: https://ipha.com/news/post/3013/online-training-series-medical-coding-and-billing-for-public-health-services.
