MedCom System To Allow Medicare Part A And B Recipients To Verify Healthcare Benefits, Costs

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz., Oct. 24 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- MedCom USA, Inc. , a leading provider of HIPAA-compliant dental, healthcare and financial transaction solutions, is expanding its real-time eligibility solution nationally to allow Medicare A and B recipients to confirm their benefits and maximum out-of-pocket costs while they are still in the doctor's office. By verifying benefits at the time of a patient's visit, doctors and hospitals will be able to efficiently process claims and get paid in a timely manner. It is estimated that $60 billion dollars in doctors' bills go unpaid each year by patients.

"The MedCom Terminal System was expanded to address the needs of select Medicare recipients in a climate where there is significant confusion among them about their benefits and their increased healthcare costs," said Bill Williams, Chief Executive Officer of MedCom. "It was equally important to continue to provide doctors and hospitals with a simple, cost efficient technology to verify patients' health insurance coverage so that they can better ensure payment."

The system, a point-of-service terminal, is about the size of a desk phone, or, alternatively, MedCom System services can be accessed through the Internet on their proprietary web portal. Here's how it works:

* When patients arrive at their doctor's offices, they swipe their insurance card through the MedCom Terminal System. If they do not have magnetic strips on their cards, their information is keyed into the system. * The enhanced MedCom Terminal System enables processing of eligibility and healthcare verification transactions in 30 seconds or less. * It quickly verifies a patient's insurance coverage and estimates the maximum amount that a patient could owe for a doctor's office visit based on his co-pay or deductible requirements. * Doctors and hospitals can use this information to efficiently process their claims to better ensure payments.

MedCom, in conjunction with its third party clearinghouse relationships, has established connectivity that allows healthcare providers and hospitals to check Medicare Part A and B benefits in all 50 states through one nationally supported network. MedCom is beginning to upgrade all current providers and is immediately enlarging its solicitation to new clients with those who have expressed a need for this type of benefit verification. In addition to this expanded Medicare eligibility, the MedCom System has access to over 400 payers and plans for real-time benefit verification.

According to Bruce Weitzberg, COO MedCom USA, Inc., "We are very excited about offering this Medicare connectivity to our provider community. It will increase transaction volume significantly for MedCom as well as expand the universe of potential clients, including Geriatric and Eldercare specialists, thereby increasing sales."

MedCom has been expanding its payer connections for real-time eligibility throughout the US with many payers. These connections are both direct and through third party clearinghouse relations that MedCom has established over the years.

Medicare is the federal health insurance program covering nearly 42 million Americans -- 35.4 million seniors and 6.3 million people under age 65 with permanent disabilities. Part A, the Hospital Insurance program, pays for inpatient hospital, skilled nursing facility, and hospice care and Part B, Supplementary Medical Insurance, pays for physician, outpatient, and preventive services.

About MedCom USA, Inc.

MedCom USA, Inc. provides innovative solutions for electronically processing HIPAA compliant transactions within the healthcare, financial and dental industry. MedCom USA provides a point of service terminal based transaction package and compatible Web Portal for medical and dental professionals as well as healthcare institutions. MedCom USA offers its clientele the ability to facilitate the following transactions: Real-time Patient Eligibility, Real-time Referral Certification, Real-time Claim Status, Real-time Pre authorization, 100% Paperless Claims Processing and Submission to all United States based health plans and insurance carriers, Patient Easy Pay, Merchant Processing, Electronic Check Guarantee Service, and Accounts Receivable Financing. www.medcomusa.com.

About HIPAA

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 that requires health providers and health plans to adopt standards for electronic administrative and financial transactions.

Certain matters discussed within this press release are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although MedCom USA, Inc. management believes the expectations reflected in such forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions; it can give no assurance that its expectations will be attained. Factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from expectations include industry, competitive and technological changes; risks associated with international operations and foreign currency fluctuations; the composition, timing and size of orders from and shipments to major customers; inventory obsolescence; market acceptance of new products and other risks detailed from time to time in MedCom USA, Inc.'s SEC reports, including the company's most recent 10-K and subsequent 10Q-s.

CONTACT: media, Courtney Walker of Edelman, +1-212-704-8102,Courtney.walker@edelman.com, or investors, Kent Barghols, +1-515-276-1180,BARGHOLSB@MSN.COM, both for MedCom USA, Inc.

Web site: http://www.medcomusa.com/