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TIOGA COUNTY, PA (WENY) -- The only dialysis center in Tioga County, Pennsylvania, closed in late February. In September, Independent Dialysis Group was waiting on permit approvals to move forward and now, they're waiting on paperwork.

"We took an existing provider number from Williamsport and are in the process of [transferring] it to Wellsboro. What that provides us with is the ability to not have to go back and re-credential with all of the health plans. Normally after you get your Medicare certification, then you could go with that Medicare provider number and go and talk with all the different health plans like United Healthcare, Humana, UPMC, or Geisinger to get credentialed," said one of the owners of Independent Dialysis Group (IDG), Adrian Amedia.

He said that means when you open, you can only treat Medicare patients. Then, once you get through the credentialing process with the other types of payers you can start accepting other healthcare patients. However, Amedia said this could take months.

"This was the method that we viewed as the fastest in trying to get all patients covered. [With] that process, it's not like there's a road map I can go and look up on the internet. The Department of Health has been great in pointing us in the right directions. From their perspective, they're ready to come up and visit us, but they're waiting for the green light from our fiscal intermediary which is Novitas... If I knew what I knew now, I probably would've filed that over a month ago. I just didn't know it needed to be done. I thought we had 30 days from the time of opening to file it," said Amedia.

Amedia said they need the paperwork to be processed before it's in the hands of the State Department of Health. Then, the DOH would come on-site and do a re-certification inspection.

For those unfamiliar with what a fiscal intermediary, it's a private company or other business entity that contracts with the government to process claims for programs like Medicare or Medicaid.

Right now, they're trying to work with state Senator Gene Yaw's office to move things along quickly.

"They actually reached out to me just to see how things were going and I took that as an opportunity to say 'If you're interested in helping on something, this is something we could use your help with,'" said Amedia.

Amedia said the staff are trained, supplies are on the shelves, the machines are ready to go, and the water systems are too.

"The average patient gets exposed to 120 liters of water intravenously for every four-hour treatment. It doesn't sound like a big deal for most people but in this world, they're exposed to so much, that any little bit of toxicity could hurt them dramatically," said Amedia.

Amedia said despite the delay, he's hoping they can be open by Christmas.