May 15, 2006

Effective June 23, 2006 after 6 p.m., when including an emergency certification statement on the ASC X12N 837 v.4010A1 Institutional transaction, the first five characters must be “EMCER” and the qualifier must be “ADD.” The code and qualifier must be entered in the NTE02 element (Billing Note Text) of the NTE Billing Note segment.

The “EMCER” code is required at the beginning of emergency certification statements only; do not include these characters if using the NTE02 element to submit other information. This change is only for the Institutional 837 transaction.

The Inpatient and Outpatient data specifications (part of the 837 v.4010A1 Health Care Companion Guide) have been updated to reflect this change with an example illustrating this new requirement. The companion guides are available on the ASC X12N Version 4010A1 Companion Guides and NCPDP Technical Specifications page of the Medi-Cal Web site.