Descriptions

CS 101 Quality Customer Service

Suggested Time to Complete: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
There is no limit to the numerous voices shouting out the critical need for quality customer service. Yet, time after time, we see a failure in its application. This course goes beyond the abstract and offers piece by piece, step by step, information to employees seeking to provide quality customer service. The premise of this course is twofold: quality customer service is the key to success for any employee with customer service responsibility, and quality customer service is the foundation upon which an organization's success and profits are built.

CS 102: Telephone Courtesy & Customer Service

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .175
Effective telephone skills are the cornerstone of quality customer service. Clarity of speech, sincerity and courtesy are essential to your success on the phone. This lesson is for anyone who picks up the telephone and communicates with a customer. You will learn how to improve your telephone skills, how to understand your customer's needs, and how to increase your ability to manage your customer's perception.

CS 103: Grief: Its Impact on Your Customers and You

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .175
Grief is the human reaction of sudden loss. It not only accompanies the loss of life, it is also a partner to those suffering a traumatic injury or those with a debilitating disease, both are having to accept a change in plans and dreams. Grief affects our patients, their caregivers, and you, the service provider.

CS 104: Taking the Customer's Perspective

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 1/2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
The objective of this course is to provide a genuine understanding of the HME/Rehab/Respiratory customer's perspective. The course defines that perspective as empathy and discusses its unique role in quality customer service.

CS 106: Customer Service Fast Facts

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .175
This lesson is a collection of fact-filled information about customer service, with lists, important points, rules and reminders. Think of it as a Reader's Digest version: condensed stories, all related but each about a different topic.

CS 107: Common Courtesy and Professionalism in the Home

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
This course focuses on important points in showing respect for our disabled customers through our actions, words and courteous approach. It also offers some basics on common courtesies in the homes of our customers and dealing with their problems and complaints while there.

HCM 200: Medicare Documentation Fast Facts

Suggested Time to Complete: 3 hour
Continuing Education Units: .3
As part of our commitment to continuing having the best prepared staff in the HME industry, the following pages are designed to help you prepare for the Home Care Medical Refresher courses. It offers you specifics to study and note in the 8 courses that are our core refresher courses.

HME 103: Understanding Medicare and Medicaid

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
Understanding Medicare and Medicaid provides basic information to aid in the comprehension of these programs and their impact on the way we do business.

HME 104: An Overview of Reimbursement & Managed Care

Suggested Time to Complete: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
Probably the most essential aspect of success for the Home Medical Equipment business is getting reimbursed for the equipment and services you provide. Our goal in this series of lessons is to introduce you to the number of organizations that pay your company and and explain the key elements in getting that payment.

HME 105: An Overview of HME and Its Players

Suggested Time to Complete: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course offers a great overview of our industry: the types of equipment we sell, the customers we respond to; the many individual players in our industry, including the physicians and therapists who are a part of the team in responding to patient's needs. In addition, students will gain a great understanding of the types of agencies and regulations, governmental and private, that impact HME providers, their employees and their customers.

HME 201: Anatomy & Physiology Fast Facts: An Overview

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
This course is an overview of anatomy (the study of structures and organs of the body) and physiology (the study of the function of the body parts). For those new to health care practice, it is a good foundation upon which to build an understanding of the needs of our patients and customers!

HME 202: Disabilities & Diseases - Pediatric Onset

Suggested Time to Complete: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course provides a brief overview of diseases and disabilities that most often have their onset in young children. It describes general causes and symptoms, and common treatments and equipment considerations. In addition, consideration is given to the emotional needs and concerns of such patients and the importance of their relationship with the providers of home medical equipment products and services.

HME 203: Disabilities & Diseases - Early Adult (20-50) Onset

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1

This course provides a brief overview of diseases and disabilities that most often have their onset in young adults (aged 20 - 50). It describes general causes and symptoms, and common treatments and equipment considerations. In addition, consideration is given to the emotional needs and concerns of patients and their caregivers, with a special emphasis on the role of the providers of home medical equipment products and services.

HME 204: Disabilities & Diseases - Later Adult (50+) Onset

Suggested Time to Complete: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
This course provides a brief overview of diseases and disabilities that most often have their onset in older adults over the age of 50. It describes general causes and symptoms, and common treatments and equipment considerations. In addition, consideration is given to the emotional needs and concerns of such patients and their caregivers and the importance of their relationship with the providers of home medical equipment products and services.

HME 205: Disabilities & Diseases - Sudden Onset

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
This course provides a brief overview of the disabilities that are unexpected and sudden. The course describes the causes of sudden onset disabilities and describes some of the symptoms. Common treatments and equipment considerations are discussed.

HME 206: Disabilities & Diseases - Respiratory

Suggested Time to Complete: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course provides a brief overview common respiratory diseases and disabilities. The course describes the causes of respiratory diseases and disabilities and describes some of the symptoms. Common treatments and equipment considerations are discussed.

HME 305: Infusion & Enteral Therapy

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
This course provides an overview of the types of therapies and medications offered through home infusion as well as the purpose and objectives of enteral feeding. Also included are the different types of infusion routes and access devices and the types of equipment available for these therapies.

HME 310: Basic Durable Medical Equipment/Home Medical Equipment

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
This course provides an overview of some of the most commonly provided durable medical equipment, consisting primarily of: bathroom and toileting equipment, hospital beds and supports surfaces, aids to daily living and mobility and ambulation. In addition to descriptions of products and their application, information is given indicating the types of customers who will most likely use this equipment and other kinds of home medical equipment the patient might require.

HME 311: Rehab Equipment

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 ¼ hours
Continuing Education Units: .125
A large population of individuals served by our industry consists of those with permanent disabilities such as spinal cord injuries or those with degenerative diseases such as MS or ALS. These folks are the primary users of rehab equipment. This course described this often sophisticated equipment, including manual wheelchairs, power chairs and other equipment that support the day-to-day lives of its users. This information will also provide understanding as to what other kinds of home medical equipment a patient might require.

HME 312: Respiratory Equipment

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 1/4 hour
Continuing Education Units: .125
This newly updated course provides an overview of some of the most commonly used respiratory therapy and related equipment to meet the needs of those with respiratory challenges. The course does a thorough job of describing different oxygen therapy approach, CPAP, nebulizers, aspirators and ventilators. There is also a section on responding to infant needs with apnea monitors and phototherapy.

HME 401: Respect, Confidentiality and Patient Rights

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 ¼ hours
Continuing Education Units: .125
This is an introductory course on the critical importance of respect for your patients. That respect is reflected in:

recognizing the dignity and humanity of your customers
treating all of the information they provide you as confidential
knowing and responding to the rights and responsibilities of both you and your customers.

Especially significant in this course are the practical pieces on practicing confidentiality every day in your workplace.

HME 402: Infection Control

Suggested Time to Complete: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
There has been growing concern and awareness in the United States and internationally about the spread of infectious diseases. Fear of AIDS, the result of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), has been the primary focus of concern. However, HIV is just one of the bloodborne pathogens to which any provider of health care service is exposed. With more and more patients being cared for in a home setting, it is essential that those of us associated with home care understand the importance of practicing infection control, both for our benefit and for the benefit of home patients.

HME 403: Ergonomics in the Office

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
Ergonomics is the study of workplace design: the study of how a workplace and the equipment used there can best be designed for comfort, safety, efficiency and productivity. It is the science of fitting the job to the worker. This course focuses on ergonomics in the office, especially as it relates to workstation set-up.

HME 404: Ergonomics in the Warehouse - Back Safety

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, more than one million workers suffer back injuries each year. This number doesn't include other types of work related injuries such as neck strain and knee injuries. A very high percentage of these injuries could have been prevented and it is much easier to prevent injury than to repair an injury. This course will give you the information you need to protect your back and prevent injury.

HME 405: Hazardous Materials

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
Chemicals are a major part of your workplace. There are an estimated 575,000 existing chemical products, and hundreds of new ones are being introduced annually. Because of the potential seriousness of safety and health problems due to chemical exposures, and to encourage processes to prevent the exposure, the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) issued rules in the1980s regarding the training on the handling of hazardous materials (commonly called HAZMAT). Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to explain common hazards; identify planning and skills for the prevention of hazards from chemicals; and be aware of effective procedures in responding to chemical emergencies and injuries.

HME 406: Safety and Readiness at the Worksite

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
The lessons in this course present simple ways to prepare so that accidents in the workplace either don't occur or are dealt with quickly and assuredly. Emergency procedures in responding to some injuries are presented as well as fire safety and basic elements for first aid.

HME 407: Preventing Sexual Harassment

Suggested Time to Complete: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
The first step in any education is creating awareness. This course is designed to help you become aware of your responsibility to make your workplace a comfortable place to work. This course makes note of two perspectives on this subject: how to avoid behavior that would make someone else feel uncomfortable and what to do when you feel harassed.

HME 408: Voluntary Compliance with Medicare in the HME Industry

Suggested Time to Complete: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
As an employee of an HME provider, it is essential that you understand the importance of compliance and how it affects billing, delivery, service, and all the elements of your company. The focus of this course is Medicare compliance because if you can understand and meet the standards and rules of Medicare, you will most likely meet the standards and rules for any other third party payer. The information in this course will help you identify the various agencies who influence compliance in the industry. The definitions of important terms pertaining to compliance are presented here as well as an outline of the basics of an effective compliance program. We've also included specific violations of Medicare fraud and abuse regulations and recommended ways to prevent such violations.

HME 409: The HIPAA Privacy Rule

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
This course describes in detail the Final HIPAA Privacy Rule, part of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act or HIPAA. This element of the act protects the privacy of individually identifiable health information that is stored, processed or transmitted and gives individuals the right to be informed of the privacy practices of a health care provider and to be informed of their privacy rights with respect to their protected health information. Successful completion of this course will offer the student the details he/she needs to know in order to fulfill the obligations (and opportunities) placed upon HME companies within HIPAA.

REM 101: Reimbursement: Orders and the Intake Process

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
There are two critical parts to our business. The first part is the equipment and services we provide, often necessary to sustain life, always necessary for quality of life. The second part is being reimbursed for those services. The latter can be complex, lengthy, cumbersome and the most important element to your company's success.

This course examines the intake process closely. Additionally, it addresses the assignment decision, mandatory claim submission, waiver of liability issues and payment categories. Included throughout the course are commonly used terms and their definitions.

REM 102: Reimbursement and Documentation

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .275
This course covers the critical element of DOCUMENTATION. For Home Medical Equipment (HME) providers, documentation is the key to payment. Keeping in mind that the foundation of reimbursement is based on a proper order intake, documentation is truly what insurance companies use to determine reimbursement.

Each lesson within this course defines and makes clear the elements involved in the entire documentation process, including:

verbal versus written orders
certificates of medical necessity (CMNs)
written orders prior to delivery (WOPD)
prior authorizations/advance determination of Medicare coverage (ADMC)
retrieval of a signed and completed medical necessity document
managing and monitoring documentation

REM 103: Reimbursement: Billing and Coding

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 3 hours
Continuing Education Units: .3
As part of the operational flow, it is the billing department that takes over when the intake process is complete. The billing department should actually provide a check and balance over the intake process, ensuring that after their job is complete, payment will be received.

This course completes the steps of an efficient reimbursement process - a final quality control check and generation of bills. Included in these final and complex steps are:

Order confirmation/quality control process
The billing edit review
Pricing
Billing of select payer types - coding
Monitoring and management of the billing process

REM 104: Reimbursement: Accounts Receivable Management and Collections

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 ¾ hours
Continuing Education Units: .275
The last step in a chain of events that leads to payment is the topic of this course, Accounts Receivable (A/R) Management and Collections. This is the most analytical and perhaps the most challenging of all the steps. Welcome to the world of investigation and research and the piece that makes you the A/R expert!

In this course, we will address the final steps in this process, including the following:

Discussing and understanding fundamental A/R terms
Cash posting - why it is integral to the collection process
Collecting new A/R by payer type
The Medicare appeals process
How to devise an A/R action plan for older balances
Managing and monitoring A/R collections

SLS 101: Basics

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
This course provides an introduction to sales in the Home Medical Equipment (HME) industry. We discuss the importance of a positive attitude, how you can provide service to your customer, and how to act like a professional. We also discuss how to deal with the stress of selling and your company's expectations of you.

SLS 102: Knowledge of Sales

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
In this course, we discuss what you need to know to successfully sell HME products and services. You'll learn methods and strategies to get the information you need to heighten your selling ability.

SLS 103: Sales Planning

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 3 hours
Continuing Education Units: .3
Sales Planning will explain, in detail, how to et up an effective system that will maximize the time you spend selling and will prepare you to have answers to potential questions before you make a call.

SLS 104: Prospecting

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 hour
Continuing Education Units: .1
There are four primary ways you can increase your sales revenue: add new products and/or services; increase revenue from existing customers; recapture lost customers; add new customers. The key to real growth is to increase the final category - new customers. To add new customers, you must prospect for them. While prospecting can be a challenging activity, it is the primary key for successful growth and satisfaction in a sales career.

SLS 105: Sales Calls

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course shows you how to make a winning sales call and teaches you skills for effective in-person sales calls. This information describes what you need to know to become an innovative, capable and successful salesperson.

SLS 106: Telephone Sales

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
Telephone sales are a very important part of the HME industry. In some situations telephone salespersons also provide customer service to support outside sales. This course guides you in how to use effective sales calls over the telephone.

DDT 101: Driver/Delivery Technician Fast Facts

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
Often the Driver/Delivery Technician is the only one from an HME company the end-user ever knows and ever meets. That key of being "the" company brings great responsibility and great opportunities to make a positive different. This course is covers each element of this important job - attitude, reimbursement, customer needs, and a detailed description of the delivery process. It is a great overview of the job as a whole.

DDT 102: Infection Control - Video

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
Accompanied by a video, this course does a through job of covering the very specific universal precautions necessary for a driver/delivery technician, including details on cleaning and disinfecting, use of protective barriers and routine practices.

DDT 103: Home & Environment Assessment - Video

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course offers great detail in the team effort involved in assessment of the home and environment, with a focus on the role of the Driver/Delivery Technician. The course outline what to review for home assessment, environmental risk factors and consideration of patient needs and concerns.

DDT 121: Manual Wheelchairs

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .225
Manual wheelchairs are among the most common products provided by HME companies, and also among the most critical and complex. This comprehensive course takes the Driver/Delivery Technician's expertise with manual chairs to a whole new level, covering all of the details for wheelchair selection, operation, adjustment, maintenance and repair.

DDT 131: Comprehensive O2 Service

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
The provision of medical oxygen is critical to the quality of our patient's lives. This series of three courses (including DDT 132 and DDT 133) and accompanied by a video, fully explains the opportunity for the Driver/Delivery Technician to impact positively the lives of his respiratory customers. This first course offers a comprehensive overview of respiratory equipment and accessories.

DDT 132: Patient Education and Instruction

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
Beyond delivery and set-up of the proper respiratory equipment, it is often the role of the Driver/Delivery Technician to instruct the patient and caregivers in its use and to create a comfort level of understanding and security for these new users. This comprehensive course, second in a series, offers, item by item, the steps for setting up and instructing on oxygen equipment.

DDT 133: Oxygen Transport and Tracking

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 3 hours
Continuing Education Units: .3
Medical oxygen, legally a drug, is among the most heavily regulated items in the HME industry. This course, third in a series for Driver/Delivery Technicians, details the regulations and the proper procedures for the transportation and tracking of oxygen.

PERSONAL AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT LIBRARY COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

PPD 101 - Better Communication in the Workplace

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
This course focuses on the positive communication skills for everyone in an office, in every job, employee and employer. We've always known communication is key to great customer service, but it is also key to relationships in the workplace. We will hone your skills in active listening and expressing yourself positively, but directly.

PPD 102 - Dealing with Conflict and Difficult People

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .225
This course discusses conflict in the workplace, but the heart of conflict goes to dealing with difficult people, because they tend to be at the heart of every conflict. This course utilizes your communication skills and your ability to change your perspective, your approach to conflict and to difficult people - a positive approach to working through conflict to strengthen interpersonal relationships.

PPD 104 - Professionalism - The Internal

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 ½ hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
This is the first of two courses on Professionalism. The other, PPD 105 focuses on the external aspects of professionalism: customer service, professional appearance, professional interaction and attitude, and business etiquette. This course literally considers the heart of the matter, those elements of your attitude and behavior that affect your work every day: self-confidence, ethics, and the professional approach to dealing positively with issues of diversity and persons with disabilities.

PPD 105 - Professionalism - The External

Suggested Tim to Complete Course & Test: 1 1/2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .15
This is the second of two courses on Professionalism. The first, PPD 104, considers the internal aspects of professionalism: self-confidence, ethics, and finally our view towards diversity and persons with disabilities. This one, PPD 105, focuses on the external aspects of professionalism: customer service, professional appearance, professional interaction and attitude, and business etiquette. It will confirm much of what you already know are the elements of a professional: how professionals act with customers and coworkers, how they dress, their approach in business.

PPD 201 - Stress v. You - Winning the Battle

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2.5 hours
Continuing Education Units: .25
Our intent with this course is to help you take a look at the stress in your life and seriously consider how you can better deal with it. This course helps identify causes and reactions to stress, but more importantly, offers suggestions for positively dealing with stress in our work day and our workspace.

PPD 202: Stress Management - Dealing with Time, Technology and Finances

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1.25 hours
Continuing Education Units: .125
This course is a companion to PPD 201, but focuses most significantly on organizational elements to bring order to your life and satisfaction day to day. Key to organization is time management, including creating time for those activities beyond work - family and friends and recreation. We discuss positive ways to manage your personal finances to relieve the day to day stress that impacts your work and your home.

PPD 301: Business Writing

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 hours
Continuing Education Units: .2
One of our most requested topics, this course does a great job of summarizing and clarifying the skills needed for business writing: formatting business letters, memos and emails and writing for clarity. It is a reference you will use again and again.

MANAGMENT IN THE HME INDUSTRY LIBRARY
COURSE DESCRIPTIONS

MGT 101: Overview of Management in HME

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 3 1/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .325
This course is an introduction to the skills and functions of management, with the dedicated perspective of HME. It is a great survey of thoughts on management and leadership - the entering point for all of the rest of the management courses.

MGT 102: Leadership - An Introduction

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .225
Influence is key to leadership. This course simplifies the process and discusses the impact of influence. Leadership goes beyond management techniques or supervision, it is a style built on integrity and consistency - a great start for anyone looking at management in an HME company.

MGT 103: Leadership, Management and Motivation

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 1 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .175
A real key to success in management is motivation, helping employees to be their best. This course offers some good tips on building teamwork and a positive work climate, especially through the constant change inherent in our industry.

MGT 104: Managing Conflict in the Workplace

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test: 2 1/4 hours
Continuing Education Units: .225
There are many challenges for managers: financial, organizational, planning and vision. However, perhaps none is more critical (or more dangerous) than your work to minimize and deal with conflict in the workplace. This course is written from two perspectives of management. The first is that often you will be called on to help resolve conflict between two parties, departments or employees - a difficult but eminently valuable task. The second is that you are often in the middle of conflict yourself - whether caused by you or directed at you. This course speaks to dealing positively with you own conflict situations. It serves as a great companion piece to PPD 102 - Dealing with Conflict and Difficult People.

MGT 105: Effective Management of Meetings

Suggested Time to Complete Course & Test:1 3/4 hours
Continuing Education Units:.175
Here is a little fact for those in management: As much as 40 to 60 percent of a leader's time is spent in meetings. We have two primary intents in creating this course. The first is simply to have you consider that some (many!) meetings simply are not necessary and when they are not - don't have them. The second is this: once you are convinced that a meeting is the best way to handle a situation or challenge, there are best ways to manage meetings - let's discuss those ways!