Coding and Billing Post-Cataract Eyewear DME Medicare Claims for the Optical Dispensary

Hours:  1 hour

Course Unites:  1:00

Type of presentation:  Lecture

Presenter: Pamela B Fritz

This interactive course gives opticians and billers the step-by-step process of how to submit DME Medicare claims for post-operative cataract eyewear patients' purchase and how to maximize patient benefit reimbursements for the optical.  Learn line-by-line claim entry, which items are covered and non-covered, use of modifiers and how to minimize claim rejection.  Commercial Medicare Advantage programs are discussed.  DME Supplier compliance, enrollment, timeline claim filing, and the top claim rejection codes will be viewed.  Handout:  2021 DME NJ V Code work sheet.  

 
Objective:  the course gives opticians and billers the tools to code, bill and submit claims for post-operative cataract eyewear.  It provides a DME communications model for opticians with patients and walks the opticians and billers from patient interaction to claim submission.  Creating accurate claims will result in patient satisfaction and DME Medicare compliance.

Frame Inventory:  Management, Margins and Marketing

Hours:  1 hour

Course Unites:  1:00

Type of presentation:  Lecture

Presenter: Pamela B Fritz

Learn how much frame inventory to carry and how to determine frame mix by patient Demographic. Why frame inventory software is critical.  Setting and adjusting your frame budget.  Keep you inventory fresh and timely and weeding out the “dogs”.  Working with frame reps and board space.  Determining frame prices, mark-up and margins.  Special frame categories:  insurance frames, second pair sales, Free Frame promotions.   Protocol for patient using their own frames.  Examples of frame marketing and merchandising will be shown.

 
Objective:  How to have the right frame product mix while staying within profitable budget guidelines.  Learn every aspect from frame pricing to having a good working relationship with your reps. Covers many frame marketing and sales promotions and merchandising techniques.  Inventory software suggestions will be given.

Don’t Let your Lens Cost of Goods Wreck your Bottom Line

Hours:  1 hour

Course Unites:  1:00

Type of presentation:  Lecture

Presenter: Pamela B Fritz

The importance of auditing your lens sales.   How to track lab invoices against patient invoices.   Controlling the cost of goods of lenses.  Offering the Good, Better Best Lens Tiers.  Lens pricing, margins and lens discounting policies and protocols.  The beauty of Lens Packaging.  Ala-cart pricing verses lens packages.  Suffering the insurance write offs and adjustments.  Taking advantage of your Lab’s lens specials, 2^nd pair pricing and manufacturer’s rewards programs.  Why optical software is critical to track your optical lens products.

Objective:  Independents have to sharpen their wits and their pencils if they are to make a profit on lenses these days.   Lenses wholesale and retail pricing is particularly critical to monitor.  Razor thin margins make tracking les sales data critical.  This course will suggest all the tools to run your lens sales in the most profitable manner possible

Blood Borne Pathogens

Hours:  1 hour

Course Unites:  1:00

Type of presentation:  Lecture

Presenter: William Velardi, Jr. OD

As health care workers we are all at risk of coming in contact with blood borne pathogens. It will be the intent of this class to review the three big blood borne pathogens, HIV, Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C, how they are transmitted and what to do if you think you have been exposed to any of them. We will also touch briefly on some less popular pathogens as well. And in these uncertain times, we will touch on SARS-CoV2, A.K.A. the Corona virus as well. While Corona is not a blood borne pathogen but a respiratory one, it is one that can be avoided by taking the correct simple precautions. We will take a quick look at the anatomy of the lacrimal system and tears and their role, or not, in the transmission of SARS - CoV2. And lastly, we will cover blood borne pathogens and Covid with regards to the wearing and the fitting [which includes insertion and removal training] of contact lenses.

Objective
*       At the end of this lecture the Optician will:
o       Be able to identify the three major blood borne pathogens
o       Understand the origins and pathologies associated with the blood borne pathogens
o       Have a little better understanding about SARS-CoV2 or Covid-19 and their practice
o       Understand the mechanisms for contracting blood borne pathogens
o       What to do if they believe they have been infected with a blood borne pathogen
o       How to avoid accidental or intentional contact with theses pathogens

"What Else you can do with a Contact Lens"

Hours:  2 hour

Course Unites:  2:00

Type of presentation:  Lecture

Presenter: William Velardi, Jr. OD

We all know about using contact lenses as a way of correcting an ametropia. Along with this "everyday" use come many lesser-known specialty uses for contact lenses. Uses such as, corneal rehabilitation, medication delivery and systemic and ocular medical condition monitoring, just to name a few. In these two hours we will cover these and a few other topics and we will also delve into an old use and design of contact lens that has made a resurgence in recent years, scleral lenses. Scleral lenses when used to treat keratoconus can be a life altering experience for our patients. They can give our patients back the vision they have not had in many years. Vision that some were told they would probably never have again.

Along with these "specialty" uses for lenses will be a refresher on complications of both "conventional" and "non-conventional" lens use. With patients having difficulty with access to care recently, complications from lens over-wear are an increasing problem. We will touch briefly on the major players in the realm of contact lens complications. Lastly, we will touch on the new, October 2020, changes to the FCLCA federal law regarding the release of contact lens prescriptions and sale of lenses.

Objectives

o       Be able to identify less conventional uses of contact lenses
o       Have a working knowledge of additional uses for contact lenses, beyond simply vision correction
o       Be able to enlighten others as to the additional uses of contact lenses

o       Explain the impact of cosmetic contact lenses for a deformed eye

Speaker Bios:

Pamela B. Fritz, {resident of Ophthalmology Resources, is an optical industry expert who has implemented successful management strategies in hundreds of independent optical dispensaries nationwide. She is a recognized authority in both Medicare and DME Medicare and serves as the optical industry representative on the education panel for MAC Contractor Noridian. Fritz was named, “50 of the most influential women in the optical industry” by Jobson Publishing and received an Achievement Award from The American Academy of Ophthalmology. She speaks at the AAO, the NJAO and most recently the EyeCare Leaders national conference in Colorado.

Dr. Velardi has been a therapeutic licensed Optometrist for the past 30 years. After graduating from Seton Hall Univ., he went on to get his OD degree at the Illinois College of Optometry in 1991. He began his career as a solo practice owner in Clifton where he stayed for several years. He then moved on to Delaware into an OD/MD practice and from there went on to practice in various military settings as both a contractor and government employee. He is currently practicing at Fort Eustis in Newport News Virginia and just recently moved to Williamsburg where he lives with his wife Lisa. Dr. Velardi has been an adjunct professor in Ophthalmic Science at Raritan Valley Community College for those same 30 years. He currently teaches Ocular Anatomy, Optics and Contact Lenses 1 all online and has been doing so for the past 15 years. He has also been a guest lecturer multiple times for the OANJ.
When not working, Dr. Velardi enjoys theatrical set designing and construction and watching his daughter Gina and wife Lisa perform on stage.

REGISTER HERE FOR  THE CONFERENCE