Policy & Procedures

Don't hesitate to call us with questions!

Common clinic procedures & policies outlined below for your reference.

New Patient Forms

Privacy Confidentiality

Coeur Vitality is dedicated to maintaining the privacy and confidentiality of your protected health information. In conducting our business, we will create records regarding you and the treatment and services we provide to you. We are required by law to provide you with a notice of our legal duties and the privacy practices that we maintain in our practice concerning your PHI. You will receive a complete and detailed copy of our Notice of Privacy Information Practices at your first appointment.

Privacy Practices will be followed by:

Any health care professional authorized to enter information into your medial record created and/or maintained at our clinic;
All employees, students, residents, and other service providers who have access to your health information at our clinic; and
Any member of a volunteer group, which is allowed to help you while receiving services at our clinic.

The individuals identified above will share your health information with each other for purposes of treatment, payment and health care operations, as further described in the Notice.

Disclosures of health information may be necessary for treatment, payment, and health care operations. Each of these purposes are outlined in detail in your copy of the Notice of Privacy Information.

Your rights regarding your health information:

Right to Inspect and Copy
Right to Amend
Right to Accounting of Disclosures
Right to Request Restrictions
Right to Request Confidential Communications
Right to a Paper Copy of this Notice

Payments

Patients Without Insurance Coverage

If you do not have insurance or are undergoing services or procedures not covered by insurance (ear piercing, circumcision, nutrition counseling, Botox, etc.), we ask for payment at the time of service.

We offer a 20% cash discount to our clinic visit fee-schedule to patients paying for their services in full at the time of their visit. Short-term payment plans are available but must be requested prior to services. When payment plans are instituted, no discounts apply.

Co-pays & Up To Date Insurance Information

Co-payment and Keeping Insurance Information Up To Date: Our contracts with the insurance companies require us to collect co-pays at the time of service. We will bill all health insurance companies that we are contracted with as long as you provide the correct billing information (a copy of your card works best). If you do not have a co-pay listed, you will be required to pay $30 at the time of service until this detail is later clarified. We suggest you call the number on the back of your card and know your co-pay and deductible amount. It is your responsibility to know your coverage, please make sure you have us listed as your primary provider, and be sure in advance to your appointment that our office is contracted with your insurance. If your Insurance is updated or changed, it is your responsibility to inform us and verify that your new insurance is accepted by Coeur Vitality Family Medicine. If we bill old information, this frequently causes a several month delay in payment and a re-billing fee might apply.

3rd Party Claims: If you are involved in a civil suit, auto, home or business owner’s accident and are seeking payment from the responsible party, we expect payment at the time of service. It is Coeur Vitality's policy not to bill third party's directly weather it is Aflac, auto insurance, or other responsible party’s insurance or attorney for your services in these situations due to the length of time it takes to settle these claims. Coeur Vitality will provide you a copy of your statement so you can submit your bill to the responsible party for reimbursement, but payment will be expected and due by the patient at the time of services provided by Coeur Vitality.

Appointment Policies Scheduling Appointments

Appointments Policy:

Every effort is made to remain on schedule. In order to keep the schedule on time and ensure that we do not run into the next patient’s appointment time, being more than 15 minutes late from your check-in time for an office appointment will mean cancellation for that appointment and rescheduling at a later date. Check-in time is always a minimum of 10 min prior to appointment.

● If you miss a new patient appointment twice and do not notify the office, you will not be rescheduled unless you pay a rebooking fee of $100.

● Established patients may be charged a $35 “no-show” fee if the office has not been notified of the need to cancel an appointment 24 hours prior.

● Repeated “no-shows” will result in being discharged from our office, at provider's discretion.

“Nurse Only” appointments: Scheduled only if you have an order in your chart to have a service provided that has already been discussed and approved by your provider within a certain period of time. (i.e., labs for an upcoming physical, blood draw, injection, immunization, BP recheck).

Emergencies/after hours: If you have a life-threatening emergency, you should call 911 or go immediately to the nearest emergency room. If you feel this is of an urgent matter that is not life threatening, and can’t wait until the next business day, you can call our on-call provider by following prompts on our main phone-line (208) 966-4512.

Keeping Established with Coeur Vitality

While we believe that prevention and early management is one of the keys to long term health, we also recognize the importance of being present and accessible to our patients for both chronic disease management and crisis care. Our commitment to continuity of care is demonstrated by the multiple domains we are available to follow our patients.

At Coeur Vitality we feel it is important that we see each patient at least annually to better manage your care. Our Policy is that you make an appointment every year for at least a Preventative Wellness Exam. If it has been over 2 years without a Preventative Wellness Exam with no communication, you will be inactivated as an established patient at Coeur Vitality. If you call wanting to be seen for an appointment and it has been over 2 years and you are inactivated, you will need to go through our new patient approval process again to be accepted back in the practice, and will be based upon provider panel availability (accepting or not accepting new patients).

For prescription refills, at minimum, annual physicals are required.

Outside Lab & Ancillary Services Financial Responsibilities

Laboratory and Other Ancillary Services Bill Separately:
Although Coeur Vitality provides many services within the office, at times it is necessary to utilize services from other ancillary businesses to complete your care. Our clinic is partnered with LabCorp for our routine lab work and processing. You will receive a separate statement of charges for services provided outside our office, as we do not bill for these services. An example of these services would include Lab Corp, special specimen evaluation labs, radiology services, and other specialized diagnostic testing. Any questions with statements from these ancillary services, we ask that you contact them directly as our billing department is not privy to these details. We don’t keep track of their prices directly unfortunately as they are always fluctuating, and coverage varies with each insurance plan.

Treating Minors

Services Provided to Minors: During your absence, your child may suffer an illness or injury that requires medical attention. To ensure that your child will get the necessary attention as timely as possible, please complete a Consent to Treat of a Minor form. This form gives Coeur Vitality permission to treat your child if the need arises. If we do not have this on file, we would need verbal permission that is witnessed by 2 people for us to treat without an appropriate guardian present.

Financial Responsibilities Insurance & Patient Responsibilities

Patient Responsibility to Know Individual Insurance Coverage: The financial responsibility for services rendered rest with the patient or responsible party, regardless of any insurance coverage. We see a variety of different insurance plans, it is impossible for us to know all the covered benefits, copays and deductibles for each individual plan. While it is our intention to assist you, it is still your responsibility to ensure that all services rendered are paid in full. For transparency, you can find our commonly used visit fee-schedule posted on our website coeurvitality.com and can inquire on set fees for specific procedures with our front office.

Co-payment and Keeping Insurance Information Up To Date: We will bill all health insurance companies that we are contracted with as long as you provide the correct billing information (a copy of your card works best). Co-payment is due at the time of service however, if you do not have a co-pay listed, you are required to pay $30 at the time of service. We suggest you call the number on the back of your card and know your copay and deductible amount. It is your responsibility to know your coverage, please make sure you have us listed as your primary provider and be sure our office is contracted with your insurance. If your insurance is updated or changed, it is your responsibility to inform us. If we bill old information, this frequently causes a several months delay in payment and a re-billing fee might apply.

Insurance Plan Changes First, please make sure when you are making changes to your insurance plans, that it is both an insurance that Coeur Vitality contracted with AND is accepting new patients with. As soon as you have the new insurance name and policy number, please call our office 208 966-4512 to update your billing insurance information in our system. If you arrive at your appointment without current insurance information, we will ask for $100 down-payment at the time of service towards that appointment. When you provide us with your current updated insurance information, if insurance accepted, your $100 will be applied towards your copay, deductible, and any remaining as a credit on your account. Credits more than $100 are reimbursed by our billing department once yearly, or upon request if leaving.

Annual Preventative & Medicare Wellness Appointments: It is our clinic's policy to collect a copay at the annual Preventive physical and Medicare Wellness visits as frequently we are discussing much more than just immunizations and preventative screenings, which does warrant an additional E&M office visit code to be applied to your account. We find it very valuable to be comprehensive and intentionally touch on all chronic conditions once annually, so they do not get lost to follow up, get any Rx refills lined up for the year after making sure all are still important & safe in your care, review labs together in detail addressing abnormalities at that time, and in some cases ordering new diagnostic tests or referrals. To accomplish this level of detail to your care we set aside much longer appointments, and this frequently saves you from being asked to come back for a separate appointment to manage these other conditions! If no additional medical conditions or concerns are addressed outside of the preventative wellness screening and review, then your copay will remain as a credit on your account and will be applied to your next visit! Well-Child Exams are an exception to this policy. We do not collect a copay for the well-child appointments.

Nonsufficient Funds/Collection Account: We attempt every effort to work with you to make some type of payments. We send reminder letters and final notice before sending to collection. All nonsufficient funds will be subject to a $20 fee due to the administrative time burden incurred. If your account is turned over to collections (typically only when we do not hear from you after numerous attempts of contact), you will be discharged from the practice. Our hope is not to let it go this far and encourage good communication with our billing department to set up a plan!

3rd Party Claims: If you are involved in a civil suit, auto, home or business owner’s accident and are seeking payment from the responsible party, we expect payment at the time of service. This is also true of 3rd Party Insurance plans such as AFLAC-- Coeur Vitality expects payment when the statement is sent, future reimbursement from AFLAC is the patients responsibility and delays from 3rd party claims should not affect prompt payment of outstanding bills at Coeur Vitality. We do not bill the responsible party’s insurance or attorney for your services in these situations due to the length of time it takes to settle these claims. We will provide you a copy of your statement so you can bill the responsible party.

Patients without Insurance Coverage: If you do not have insurance, we ask for payment at the time of service. We offer a 20% cash discount to patients paying for their services in full at the time of their visit. Short-term payment plans are available but must be requested prior to the services. When payment plans are instituted, no discounts apply.

Workers Compensation Claims: If you are seeing one of our providers for an injury that occurred during the course of your employment, please be sure to notify the receptionist that your injury is “work-related”. Please be advised that our office is obligated by law to report all work-related injuries to the Department of Labor and Industries. WE DO NOT ACCEPT WA WORKERS COMP(L&I). Some of our providers are willing to work with Idaho Workers Compensation, but this must be considered on a case by case basis with your provider depending on their comfort level. It is your responsibility to check with your work's HR department to determine if your employer requires you to be seen by a specific contracted clinic for these claims as some employers may not allow you to utilize your primary care physician for these claims. If we do end up seeing you for this work-related injury under Idaho Work Comp., we will need the information listed below before we can see you, otherwise you will be expected to pay at the time of service for any visits that is work-related.

● Name & address of employer worker’s compensation carrier

● Exact date of your injury.

● Claim number, case manager’s name and contact information

If you ever receive a bill that you feel is incorrect, please notify our billing company, 208 966-4437 or email them at billing@coeurvitality.com as soon as possible so that they can address the issue.

Annual Physicals Annual Preventative & Medicare Wellness Appointments

Annual Preventative & Medicare Wellness Appointments: It is our clinic's policy to collect a co-pay at the annual Preventative physical and Medicare Wellness visits as frequently we are discussing much more than just immunizations and preventative screenings, which does warrant an additional E&M office visit code be applied to your account. We find it very valuable to be comprehensive and intentionally touch on all chronic conditions once annually, so they do not get lost to follow up, get any Rx refills lined up for the year after making sure all are still important & safe in your care, review labs together in detail addressing abnormalities at that time, and in some cases ordering new diagnostic tests or referrals. To accomplish this level of detail to your care we set aside much longer appointments, and this frequently saves you from being asked to come back for a separate appointment to manage these other conditions! If no additional medical conditions or concerns are addressed outside of preventative wellness screening and review, then your copay will remain as a credit on your account and be applied to your next visit!

Keeping Established with Coeur Vitality

For prescription refills, at minimum, annual physicals are required.

Rescheduling Appointments Missed or Late Appointments

We understand that unforeseen situations may arise causing you to cancel or reschedule your appointment. However, please be respectful of our patients that need to be seen sooner by notifying our office at least 24 hours prior to your scheduled appointment time. Cancellation without 24 hours advance notice will be considered a "late cancellation". For missed appointments or if showing up >15 minutes past your appointment time, these will be considered “no show's”. Multiple "no-shows" can be very disruptive to our physicians’ schedule and prevent other patients an opportunity to see their provider. Every effort is made to remain on schedule. In order to keep the schedule on time, being more than 15 minutes late for an office appointment will mean cancellation for that appointment and rescheduling for a later date. This is important so that we do not run into the next patient’s appointment time and shift the entire schedule behind.

If you miss a new patient appointment TWICE and do not notify the office, you will not be rescheduled unless you pay a re-booking fee of $100.
Established patients may be charged a $35 fee for "late cancellations" if the office has not been notified of the need to cancel an appointment 24 hours prior, or with “no-shows”.
Repeated “no-shows” or late cancellations will result in being discharged from our office, at provider's discretion.

If you have had multiple late cancellations or no-show’s (this includes presenting more than 15 min late to appointments) you may be given first a warning notice, then a letter of dismissal from the clinic if the warning is not heeded.

Prescription Refill Policy Rx Refills

Prescription Refills Policy: For pre-existing prescriptions written by your provider, many can be triaged and refilled when are appropriate. However please understand if follow-up or lab monitoring is overdue-- you may be asked to schedule an appointment prior to refills being granted. If new prescriptions are being requested, staff will be asking you to schedule an appointment with your provider to discuss indications on all new prescriptions.

For existing prescription renewals, we require 48-72 hours for prescription refills to be processed. We request that you call your pharmacy first and ask them to send the request electronically. Please call your pharmacy to check if the process has been completed. If in extenuating circumstances refills need to be filled sooner, call the clinic and we of course will try to assist.

Policies Medical Records

Medical Records Policy:
Coeur Vitality is happy to provide each patient with one copy of their chart (up to 30 pages) free of charge. If records are over 30 pages or additional copies of the chart are requested by the patient, there will be a charge per page and payment will need to be received before records are released. Please allow 7 to 10 working days for your medical record release request to be processed. If you have a situation in which you need your copies released sooner, please contact us and they will always try to accommodate your request.

Telephone Correspondence

Every phone call is important to us, and we will attempt to answer your calls and return your phone messages as promptly as possible. If it is a life-threatening situation, please hang up and call 911 or go to your local emergency room. If your call is a true urgent matter, please speak to the front desk receptionist rather than leaving a voicemail with your providers nurse so that they can facilitate prompt triaging of your situation. Please allow 24 hours for non-urgent calls. We try to return all voicemail messages before the end of each business day. Voice messages received after 4 pm, may not be returned until the next business day. Please be aware that the providers will not leave their scheduled patients to return routine phone calls; these are generally answered after patient care sessions are finished. We do encourage you to leave a detailed message, spelling your name, as we check our voicemail frequently throughout the day.

Good medical care cannot always be accomplished over the phone, so we may advise you to schedule an office visit to discuss your concerns, problems, or test results.

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