6,879,959       Filed: January 21, 2000          Issued: April 12, 2005      Pendency: 5.25 years      

L&H

Method of adjudicating medical claims based on scores that determine medical procedure monetary values

          ASSIGNEE:    Quality Care Solutions, Inc. (Phoenix, AZ)      

                  FIELD:     Medical claim adjudication

        PROBLEMS:    A significant number of medical claims must be reprocessed by a medical service provider due to clerical input errors.  The pre-approval process for some claim procedures is time consuming and neither patient nor provider friendly.  Administrative overhead is costly.

       SOLUTIONS:    An improved method of processing medical claims/method of adjudicating medical claims/method of managing medical contracts/method of down-coding medical claims is provided to overcome the disadvantages of the prior art. The method can be performed real-time without a time delay of weeks or even a day. The method described provides a more cost efficient, more reliable, and more accurate method of processing medical claims/method of adjudicating medical claims/method of managing medical contracts/method of down-coding medical claims, and the method is both patient-oriented and medical service provider-oriented.

6,886,061        Filed: November 21, 2002     Issued: April 26, 2005      Pendency: 2.4 years        

L&H

Electronic record system and control program device with display and tablet function for manipulating display area functions with pen stylus

          ASSIGNEE:    NEC Corporation (Tokyo, JP); Kanagawa (JP); Osaka (JP)                     

                  FIELD:     Electronic medical record system

        PROBLEMS:    A paper based medical record system creates storage problems which results in short record retention to conserve space.  Conventional electronic medical record systems which involve keyboard or mouse input which is difficult, disrupts the doctor, and may create patient concerns.  Pen tablet input systems also have problems.

       SOLUTIONS:    A pen tablet system which incorporates free writing solves these problems.

6,891,946        Filed: January 25, 2002          Issued: May 10, 2005       Pendency: 3.3 years        

L&H

Automated phone priorities

          ASSIGNEE:    Walgreen Co.  (Deerfield, IL)    

                  FIELD:     The automatic routing of telephone calls within a pharmacy to maximize customer service and internal workflow

        PROBLEMS:    No telephone call routing systems to date have been developed that take into account the unique skill sets of pharmacists, technicians, and other staff members when distributing telephone calls to increase the overall workflow of a pharmacy as a whole.

       SOLUTIONS:    Provide an electronic means to match a caller to the pharmacy based on the type of caller (e.g. prescriber, patient, insurer) to an available pharmacy employee who has signed into the system with functional resources necessary to address the caller’s specific needs.

6,895,390        Filed: April 20, 2000              Issued: May 17, 2005       Pendency: 5.1 years

Continuation of 09/327,728 now patent # 6,061,661  

L&H

System for monitoring increasing income financial products

          ASSIGNEE:      None   

                  FIELD:     Monitoring investments in a fund established to provide increasing income to subscriber/survivors investing in a financial product – which can be life insurance, an annuity, mutual fund, or other similar financial product

        PROBLEMS:    Essentially, this is an opportunity that has not been previously addressed.  That is, this is a process that allows individuals to invest in a fund and realize increasing income created by income forgone by deaths in the subscriber group.  It appears to be something like a tontine.

       SOLUTIONS:    Provide a system that responds better to administrative problems associated with the increasing income financial product described.