24-37-2: Definitions.

As used in the Fair Pricing for Routine Medical Care Act:

A. "affiliated with" means that a person is:

(1) employed by a hospital or health system; or

(2) under a professional services agreement, faculty agreement or management agreement with a hospital or health system that permits the hospital or health system to bill on behalf of the person;

B. "campus" means:

(1) a hospital's main buildings;

(2) the physical area immediately adjacent to a hospital's main buildings;

(3) structures owned by a hospital that are not strictly contiguous to the main buildings but are located within two hundred fifty yards of the main buildings; or

(4) any other area that has been determined by the federal centers for medicare and medicaid services, on an individual case-by-case basis, to be part of a hospital's campus;

C. "facility fee" means a fee charged or billed by a hospital or health system for outpatient hospital services that is:

(1) intended to compensate the health system or hospital for operational expenses; and

(2) separate and distinct from a professional fee charged or billed by a hospital or health system for professional medical services;

D. "freestanding emergency department" means a facility licensed by the health care authority that is separate from an acute care hospital and that provides twenty-four-hour emergency care to patients at the same level of care that a hospital-based emergency department delivers;

E. "health facility" means a health facility or health agency required to be licensed by the health care authority pursuant to the Health Care Code [Chapter 24A NMSA 1978];

F. "health system" means a:

(1) parent corporation of one or more hospitals and any person affiliated with the parent corporation through ownership, governance, membership or other means; or

(2) hospital and any person affiliated with the hospital through ownership, governance, membership or other means;

G. "hospital" means a health facility that is licensed by the health care authority as a hospital;

H. "preventive health care service" means a service recommended by the United States preventive services task force;

I. "rural" means a rural county or an unincorporated area of a partially rural county, as designated by the health resources and services administration of the United States department of health and human services; and

J. "telehealth" means the use of electronic information, imaging and communication technologies, including interactive audio, video, data communications and store-and-forward technologies, to provide and support health care delivery, diagnosis, consultation, treatment, transfer of medical data and education when distance separates the patient and the health care provider.