Information Bulletin, August 2003
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New Addresses for SPARCS Administrative & Production Control Units Payer Identification Numbers Patient Status |
New Addresses for SPARCS Administrative & Production Control Units
The SPARCS Administrative Unit & Production Control Unit officially moved to 800 North Pearl Street, Albany as of August 4, 2003. The US Postal Service address remains the same, but the courier address has changed for both units.
Send tapes, cartridges or diskettes containing production data to:
| If regular mail delivery (i.e. US Postal Service) Network Systems Operations New York State Department of Health Production Control Albany, NY 12237-0024 |
If other than regular mail delivery (i.e. all forms of express mail) Network Systems Operations New York State Department of Health Production Control 800 North Pearl Street Second Floor - Room 213 Albany, NY 12204 |
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Correspondence with the SPARCS Administrative Unit should be addressed as follows:
| If regular mail delivery (i.e. US Postal Service) SPARCS Administrative Unit New York State Department of Health Albany, NY 12237-0023 |
If other than regular mail delivery (i.e. all forms of express mail) SPARCS Administrative Unit New York State Department of Health 800 North Pearl Street Second Floor - Room 231 Albany, NY 12204 |
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The move also affected the monthly updates. In order to make sure all files sent to SPARCS for processing during this time are included in this month's update; the update process is being delayed until all files received during the move are edited. SPARCS expects the delay to be no more than two weeks.
Payer Identification NumbersSPARCS has received numerous calls from facilities trying to get the NAIC numbers for the insurance companies. We would like to remind SPARCS data submitters and users about the link to the New York State Insurance Department Regulated Insurers Directory. This site provides online verification of payer identification numbers, including the National Association of Insurance Commissioner (NAIC) identifiers for insurance companies in New York State. This link is also available on SPARCS public web site under Other Related Web Sites. The edit specifications also allow facilities to report the NEIC number instead of the NAIC number. See Data Element 30005, in the SPARCS Input Data Dictionary http://www.health.state.ny.us/statistics/sparcs/sysdoc/elements_837/index.htm. When a number cannot be found for an insurance company outside of New York State, enter 88888.
Patient StatusQuestion: If a patient goes from being an ambulatory surgery patient to an inpatient, what records should be reported to SPARCS, an inpatient record or both an inpatient record and an ambulatory surgery record?
Answer: However the facility bills for the services. For this instance it is understood that some data would be lost, but that is better than creating more work for the facility by submitting artificial billing records to SPARCS.
Question: How should data be sent to SPARCS, for a non-billable patient stay? For example, if a patient was admitted for surgery, vital signs were taken, then the surgery cancelled and the patient sent home.
Answer: If the facility generates no bill for the visit, then nothing should be sent to SPARCS.
