Projected treatment plan by the primary care physician or discharging provider for the patient involving subsequent health care after formal release from the hospital as an inpatient. This may include home care, transfer to another facility, postoperative follow-up office visit, medication administration, and so on. Discharge plans are a requirement of the Medicare program and The Joint Commission for all hospital patients. Also called discharge planning .

Clause in an insurance contract about a small estates law that releases an insurance company from liability if it pays the proceeds to the deceased insured’s estate.

1. Disposition of the patient at the time of hospital discharge. This may be documented as patient left against medical advice, patient released to home, patient transferred to a skilled nursing facility or acute care hospital, or patient expired. 2. The patient discharge status is entered in Field 17 of the Uniform Bill (UB-04) inpatient hospital billing claim form.

Report prepared by the patient’s attending physician at the conclusion of a patient’s hospital stay that summarizes the diagnosis, treatment, and results and outlines any further treatment after discharge. Also see abstract and discharge plan .

Formal reassignment of an inpatient to another facility for further health care.

Financial account balances of patients’ records that remain uncoded after the bill-hold period expires or claims that have not passed the edits and have not yet been corrected.

In managed care plans, this is a form used when a patient presents for services without a referral to a specialist. It may also be used when a patient accesses services of a primary care provider (PCP) who is not the patient’s designated PCP or is not in the PCP’s call share group. The patient is asked to sign this form to indicate an understanding that he or she may be financially responsible for charges incurred during the visit.

Access, release, transfer, or otherwise divulge health information to any internal or external user of the data.

Under the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), a log that lists the individuals and companies that have received personal health information (PHI) for use that is unrelated to treatment and payment. Items to be documented must include date of disclosure, name of entity that received the PHI, brief description of the PHI disclosed, and brief statement of the purpose of the disclosure.