OAR 410-125-0400: Discharge

(1) A discharge from a hospital is the formal release of a patient to home, to another facility such as an intermediate care facility or nursing home, to a home health care agency, or to another provider of health care services. (2) For services beginning January 1, 1993, and later, the transfer of a patient from acute care to a distinct part physical rehabilitation unit (i.e., a unit exempt from the Medicare Prospective Payment System) within the same hospital will be considered a discharge. The admission to the rehabilitation unit is billed separately. All other transfers occurring within a hospital, including transfers to Medicare PPS-exempt psychiatric units, will not be considered discharges, and all charges for services must be submitted on a single UB-04 billing for the admission. (3) Transfer from a hospital occurs when an individual is formally released to another acute care hospital, to a long-term acute care hospital, to a skilled nursing facility, or an intermediate care facility. When a physician sends a patient directly to another hospital for further inpatient care, the discharge should be billed as a transfer, regardless of the mode of transportation. (4) When the Division receives claims from two hospitals for the same patient, and the date of discharge from one hospital is the same as the date of admission to the other, the Division will assume that a transfer has occurred. The Division will change the discharge status code on the first claim to 02 (Transferred to Another Acute Care Facility), automatically generating an adjustment if the claim has already been adjudicated, unless discharge status on the claim is already 02 (Transfer) or 07 (Discharge AMA). If it is believed that the Division made an error in assigning Discharge Status code 02 to a claim, the hospital may submit an Adjustment Request along with supporting documentation from the medical record. (5) A transfer between units within a hospital is not a transfer for billing purposes, except in the case of transfers to distinct part physical rehabilitation units. Note that transfers in the other direction from rehabilitative care to acute care are not considered discharges from the rehabilitation unit unless the stay in the acute setting exceeds seven days. Stays of seven days or less in the acute care setting may not be billed separately. (6) Some transfers, including transfers to distinct part rehabilitation units, require prior authorization.