Member Article

AUTHORIZATION TO RENDER SERVICES

The Secretary of Health and territorial entities will authorize, within a short period of time, and temporarily, health service providers who are registered in the REPS to:

• Temporarily adapt a place not destined to render health services, inside or outside their facilities.
• Temporarily convert or adapt a health service to render another, for which the health service provider is not authorized for.
• Expand the capacity of an enabled service.
• Render services in modalities or complexities different from those enabled.
  
  

The request for a temporary authorization must contain: the name of the service to be provided, the modality and complexity in which it will be provided, the place where the service will be provided, the contact email and, if applicable, the installed capacity and interdependent services.

The Secretary of Health or entity in charge can perform visits before granting the authorization and, if the deadline to respond is not met, it is understood that authorization has been granted.

TELEHEALTH SERVICE

Health service providers must implement accessible digital platforms, with audio and video standards, that allow the diagnosis and monitoring of patients who, due to their geographical location or difficulty to access, must access health services through telehealth.

The authorized professional will prescribe medications in the telemedicine modality by sending the scanned prescription with the signature of the treating physician, using the platform of the health service provider.

Patients can send their informed consent by image. In the event that the consent cannot be forwarded, the treating physician shall record in the medical history: (i) the information provided and the scope of care and (ii) that the patient freely, voluntarily and consciously accepted the assistance.

PRICES

The rates for health services and technology may not be increased beyond the inflation caused during the emergency. The Ministry of Health will define a group of goods and services that are basic and necessary for COVID-19 patient care and ADRES will pay according to said value.

FLEXIBILIZATION IN CONTRACTING

The Decree (i) temporarily eliminates the requirement applicable to State Companies to obtain authorization to contract with private Health Provider Institutions, when the State Company does not have the capacity to provide the service or when they fail to comply with the results and to provide health services to poor population uninsured and not covered by subsidies; and (ii) makes it possible to prioritize contracts to mitigate and contain COVID-19.

FINANCING SOLUTIONS

The Decree (i) prioritizes resources to mitigate the effects of the emergency; (ii) exempts the payment of the fee imposed by INVIMA to request the approval of research protocol studies that are intended to support strategies to mitigate COVID-19, during the emergency; (iii) allows the Ministry of Health to directly transfer resources to finance operations for the provision of health services; (iv) eliminated the incorporation of infrastructure, endowment and biomedical equipment projects in the Biennial Public Investment Plan; (v) established that the balances, surpluses, returns, resources not distributed by the department or the district must be assigned and distributed to the State Companies to guarantee the provision of health services; (vi) indicates that ADRES will pay Health Provider Companies theCapitation Payment Unit value of suspended contributors and their families and will be able to compensate the debt with Health Provider Companies automatically and if the recovering entity has no debts, it may request that the resources be deposited to its service providers, suppliers or other creditors; (vii) allowed the use of the balances in the master accounts and surpluses of assigned income that will remain in ADRES for containment and effects of COVID-19; (viii) contemplates that health resources with a specific destination cannot change its destination, unless the law excepts it, (ix) extends the periods in which the government may initiate public credit transactions to finance debt derived from health services and technologies not financed by Capitation Payment Unit .

DECISIONS ON HUMAN TALENT IN HEALTH

All human talent in health in practice or training must be prepared and available, on a mandatory basis, to strengthen and support providers, with some exceptions and may have a temporary financial recognition, charged to ADRES, which will not constitute a factor of wage.

INCAPCACITATION DUE TO COVID-19

COVID-19 is included as a direct occupational disease for workers in the health sector.The resources for the payment of incapacitation by COVID-19 will be reviewed.

SEE DECREE538 OF2020