Bimergen Energy Corp 10-K

ITEM 1. BUSINESS Spine Injury Solutions Inc. was incorporated under the laws of Delaware on March 4, 1998. We changed our name from Spine Pain Management Inc. to Spine Injury Solutions, Inc. on October 1, 2015. We are a technology, marketing, billing, and collection company facilitating diagnostic services for patients who have sustained spine injuries resulting from traumatic accidents. We deliver turnkey solutions to spine surgeons, orthopedic surgeons and other healthcare providers for necessary and appropriate treatment of musculo-skeletal spine injuries resulting from automobile and work-related accidents. Our goal is to become a leader in providing technology and monetizing services to spine and orthopedic surgeons and other healthcare providers to facilitate proper treatment of their injured clients. By monetizing the providers accounts receivable, which includes diagnostic testing and non-invasive surgical care, patients are not unnecessarily delayed or prevented from obtaining needed treatment. By facilitating early treatment through affiliated doctors, we believe that health conditions can be prevented from escalating and injured victims can be quickly placed on the road to recovery. Through our affiliate system, we facilitate spine surgeons, orthopedic surgeons and other healthcare providers to provide reasonable, necessary, and appropriate treatments to patients with musculo-skeletal spine injuries. We assist the centers that provide the spine diagnostic injections and treatment and pay the doctors a fee for the medical procedures they performed. After a patient is billed for the procedures performed by the affiliated doctor, we take control of the patients’ unpaid bill and oversee collection. In most instances, the patient is a plaintiff in an accident case, where the patient is represented by an attorney. Typically, the defendant (and/or the insurance company of the defendant) in the accident case pays the patient’s bill upon settlement or final judgment of the accident case. The payment to us is made through the attorney of the patient. In most cases, we must agree to the settlement price and the patient must sign off on the settlement. Once we are paid, the patient’s attorney can receive payment for his or her legal fee. During the fourth quarter of 2018, the decision was made to discontinue funding future medical procedures due to our cash position, and we have not funded any procedures in 2019 or 2020 and will not do so unless we can access additional capital. However, we continue to actively pursue the collection of previously funded procedures. Without additional funding, there is no guarantee that we can continue as a going concern. We own a patented device and process by which a video recording system is attached to a fluoroscopic x-ray machine, the “four camera technology,” which we believe can attract additional physicians and patients as well as provide us with additional revenue streams with our new programs designed to assist in treatment documentation. We have refined the technology, through research and development, resulting in a fully commercialized Quad Video Halo System 3.0 (“QVH”). Using this technology, diagnostic and treatment procedures are recorded from four separate video feeds that capture views from both inside and outside the body, and a video is made which is given to the patient’s representative to verify the treatment received. In September 2014, we created a wholly owned subsidiary, Quad Video Halo, Inc. The purpose of this entity is to hold certain company assets affiliated with the QVH units. Billing and Operations We work with independent medical contractors who perform the medical services for patients and bill a fixed fee for the services. Historically, we funded certain spine injury diagnostic centers where we work with healthcare providers as independent contractors to perform medical services for patients (although we discontinue funding future medical procedures during the fourth quarter of 2018—see above). We pay the healthcare providers for medical services performed. The patients are billed based on Current Procedural Terminology (“CPT”) codes for the medical procedure performed. CPT codes are numbers assigned to every task and service a medical practitioner may provide to a patient including medical, surgical and diagnostic services. CPT codes are developed, maintained and copyrighted by the American Medical Association. Patients are billed at the normal billing amount, based on national averages, for a particular CPT code procedure. We take control of the patients’ unpaid bills. The clinic facilities where our spine injury diagnostic centers operate are owned or leased by a medical affiliate or third party. We have no ownership interest in these clinic facilities, nor do we have any responsibilities towards building or operating the clinic facilities. Marketing Direct contact with key spine surgeons, orthopedic surgeons and other healthcare providers who are highly visible in their communities is an important step in targeting appropriate referral sources. Additional marketing to spine surgeons is done at national medical meetings and trade shows. 5 Table of Contents Governmental Regulation All of the medical diagnostic procedures offered at the clinics are performed by independent medical contractors, who are subject to regulation by a number of governmental entities at the federal, state, and local levels. We are subject to laws and regulations relating to business corporations in general. In recent years, Congress and state legislatures have introduced an increasing number of proposals to make significant changes in the healthcare system. Changes in law and regulatory interpretations could reduce our revenue and profitability. Corporate Practice of Medicine and Other Laws We are not licensed to practice medicine. Most states in which our business operates or in which we anticipate it will operate, limits the practice of medicine to licensed individuals or professional organizations comprised of licensed individuals. Business corporations generally may not exercise control over the medical decisions of physicians. Many states also limit the scope of business relationships between business entities and medical professionals, particularly with respect to fee splitting. Most state fee-splitting laws only prohibit a physician from sharing medical fees with a referral source, but some states have interpreted certain management agreements between business entities and physicians as unlawful fee-splitting. Statutes and regulations relating to the practice of medicine, fee-splitting, and similar issues vary widely from state to state. Because these laws are often vague, their application is frequently dependent on court rulings and attorney general opinions. There are many states that permit the corporate practice of medicine, and we are exploring opportunities in these states. Under the affiliate doctor agreements, the doctors retain sole responsibility for all medical decisions, developing operating policies and procedures, implementing professional standards and controls, and maintaining malpractice insurance. We attempt to structure all our health services operations, including arrangements with our doctors, to comply with applicable state statutes regarding corporate practice of medicine, fee-splitting, and similar issues. However, there can be no assurance: ● that private parties, courts or governmental officials with the power to interpret or enforce these laws and regulations, will not assert that we are in violation of such laws and regulations; ● that future interpretations of such laws and regulations will not require us to modify the structure and organization of our business; or ● that any such enforcement action, which could subject us and our affiliated professional groups to penalties or restructuring or reorganization of our business, will not adversely affect our business or results of operations. HIPAA Administrative Simplification Provisions — Patient Privacy and Security The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, commonly known as “HIPAA,” requires the adoption of standards for the exchange of health information in an effort to encourage overall administrative simplification and to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the healthcare industry. Pursuant to HIPAA, the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services has issued final rules concerning the privacy and security of health information, the establishment of standard transactions and code sets, and the adoption of a unique employer identifier and a national provider identifier. Noncompliance with the administrative simplification provisions can result in civil monetary penalties up to $100 per violation as well as criminal penalties that include fines and imprisonment. The Department of Health and Human Services Office of Civil Rights is charged with implementing and enforcing the privacy standards, while the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are responsible for implementing and enforcing the security standards, the transactions and code sets standards, and the other HIPAA administrative simplification provisions. The HIPAA requirements only apply to “covered entities,” such as health plans, healthcare clearinghouses, and healthcare providers, which transmit any health information in electronic form. Our business is likely considered a “covered entity” under HIPAA. Of the HIPAA requirements, the privacy standards and the security standards have the most significant impact on our business operations. The privacy standards require covered entities to implement certain procedures to govern the use and disclosure of protected health information and to safeguard such information from inappropriate access, use, or disclosure. Protected health information includes individually identifiable health information, such as an individual’s medical records, transmitted or maintained in any format, including paper and electronic records. The privacy standards establish the different levels of individual permission that are required before a covered entity may use or disclose an individual’s protected health information and establish new rights for the individual with respect to his or her protected health information. 6 Table of Contents The final security rule establishes security standards that apply to covered entities. The security standards are designed to protect health information against reasonably anticipated threats or hazards to the security or integrity of the information, and to protect the information against unauthorized use or disclosure. The security standards establish a national standard for protecting the security and integrity of medical records when they are kept in electronic form. The administrative simplification provisions of HIPAA require the use of uniform electronic data transmission standards for healthcare claims and payment transactions submitted or received electronically. We believe that we are in substantial compliance with the transaction and code set standards. The transaction standards require us to use standard code sets when we transmit health information in connection with certain transactions, including health claims, health payments and remittance advices. In addition, the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services issued a final rule that requires each healthcare provider to adopt a standard unique health identifier, the National Provider Identifier (“NPI”). The NPI will identify healthcare providers in the electronic transactions for which the Secretary has already adopted standards (the “standard transactions”). These transactions include claims, eligibility inquiries and responses, claim status inquiries and responses, referrals, and remittance advices. All health plans and all healthcare clearinghouses must accept and use NPIs in standard transactions. Other Privacy and Confidentiality Laws In addition to the HIPAA requirements described above, numerous other state and federal laws regulate the privacy of an individual’s health information. These laws specify how an individual’s health information may be used internally, the persons to whom health information may be disclosed, and the conditions under which such uses and disclosures may occur. Many states have requirements relating to an individual’s right to access his or her own medical records, as well as requirements relating to the use and content of consent or authorization forms. Also, because of employers’ economic interests in paying medical bills for injured employees and in the timing of the injured employees’ return to work, many states have enacted special confidentiality laws relating to disclosures of medical information in workers’ compensation claims. These laws limit employer access to such information. Many states have also passed laws that regulate the notification process to individuals when a security breach involving an individual’s personally identifiable information, such as social security number or date of birth, occurs. To the extent that state law affords greater protection of an individual’s health information than that provided under HIPAA, the state law will control. We anticipate that there will be more regulation in the areas of privacy and confidentiality, particularly with respect to medical information. We regularly monitor the privacy and confidentiality requirements that relate to our business, and we anticipate that we may have to modify our operating practices and procedures in order to comply with these requirements. Environmental Although we currently contract with independent contractor medical providers, who are responsible for compliance with environmental laws, our operations may be subject to various federal, state, and local laws and regulations relating to the protection of human health and the environment, including those governing the management and disposal of infectious medical waste and other waste generated and the cleanup of contamination. If an environmental regulatory agency finds any of our facilities to be in violation of environmental laws, penalties and fines may be imposed for each day of violation and the affected facility could be forced to cease operations. The responsible party could also incur other significant costs, such as cleanup costs or claims by third parties, as a result of violations of, or liabilities under, environmental laws. Although we believe that our independent medical providers’ environmental practices, including waste handling and disposal practices, will be in material compliance with applicable laws, future claims or violations, or changes in environmental laws could have an adverse effect on our business. Competition The market to provide healthcare pain diagnostic services is highly competitive and fragmented. Our primary competitors are typically independent physicians, chiropractors, hospital emergency departments, and hospital-owned or hospital-affiliated medical facilities. As managed care techniques continue to gain acceptance in the automobile accident marketplace, we believe that our competitors will increasingly consist of nationally-focused care management service companies providing their service to insurance companies and litigation defense experts. Because the barriers to entry in our geographic markets have a low threshold and our diagnostic centers’ patients have the flexibility to move easily to new healthcare service providers, the addition of new competitors may occur relatively quickly. Some of our affiliated physicians and other healthcare providers may elect to compete with us by offering their own products and services to patients. If competition within our industry intensifies, our ability to assist patients or associated physicians, or maintain or increase our revenue growth, price flexibility and control over medical costs, trends, and marketing expenses, may be compromised. 7 Table of Contents In order to mitigate the effects of intensifying competition, we will make careful study of population trends and demographic growth patterns in determining the best locations to compete. Moreover, we will endeavor to have all of our physicians under strict contract to avoid unnecessary attrition and loss of skilled personnel. Employees We currently have one paid full time employee, plus one collection consultant and one QVH consultant at our corporate headquarters. We expect to continue to use independent contractors, consultants, attorneys and accountants as necessary, to complement services rendered by our employee.