Australian Immunisation Register uploads

Use the Claims Status (Online Claiming) > AIR Claims tab to view a list of all immunisations recorded in Communicare where the immunisation type has a valid AIR code, and to check that the immunisation record has been successfully uploaded to Australian Immunisation Register (AIR).

To view the immunisations recorded in Communicare, select File > Online Claiming > AIR Claims tab.
Example AIR Claims
All immunisations recorded in Communicare where the immunisation type has a valid AIR code that meet the following criteria are listed:
  • The immunisation must have a valid Claiming Provider, which is sent with the AIR record.
  • A value is required for Dose Number or Dose (this course)
    Note:

    If a value is recorded for both Dose Number and Dose (this course), Dose Number has precedence.

  • The immunisation was added, or a recall completed, after 1995
  • The immunisation has a valid export code in File > Reference Tables > Clinical Item Types. Ask your Communicare Administrator about this. If you are using the immunisation list supplied by Communicare, this is up-to-date.
  • The patient must have valid Medicare details recorded in Communicare.
    Note: Some external bodies including Medicare and the Australian Immunisation Register do not yet recognise sexes other than Male or Female.
Each entry includes the following information:
  • Claim ID - a unique identifier for a given month which together with the date, uniquely identifies an AIR record. If your health service is using batch claims, each item in a batch is assigned the same claim ID.
  • Sent - a flag showing whether the AIR record has been sent to the AIR or not. After the AIR record has been sent, the immunisation cannot be modified.
  • Date performed - the date when the immunisation was performed.
  • Claiming Provider - the provider sent with the record. The provider is selected using the following criteria, in the order listed. If no provider exists for any of the criteria, the record is not submitted.
    • AIR Provider number against the encounter place of the service. If this number does not belong to an actual provider, the encounter place name is shown instead.
    • If no AIR Provider number has been entered against the encounter place, the provider number of the default AIR claimant recorded against the encounter place.
    • If there is no default AIR claimant recorded against that encounter place, the provider number of the provider who recorded the immunisation.
    • If this provider doesn't have a valid provider number for this encounter place, the provider number of any other claiming provider that was on the same service is used.
  • Patient Name & Patient Family Name - the patient's HCH Tier detail is highlighted if the patient is registered for HCH and the tier is recorded.
  • Age
  • Immunisation description - the immunisation's clinical item, Dose or Dose (this course) and any comments
  • Status - current status of the AIR record upload. If this is blank, an AIR record has not yet been submitted for this immunisation.
The following patient and provider identifier information is also uploaded to the AIR:
  • The patient's IHI
  • Information about who administered the immunisation and who entered the data, for both the individual, using the HPI-I, and organisation, using the HPI-O
For more information about identifiers, see HI Service.

Filtering the immunisations list

Set filters to limit the number of immunisations displayed.

To filter the immunisation list:
  1. Apply one of more of the following filters:
    • Claim ID - enter a value to list records that contain only the specified claim ID. Enter as much of the claim ID as required. For example, P003 returns P0031@, P0031@... P0039@.

      To search for inpatient claim IDs, enter a search term starting with #. For example, #P003 returns #P0031@, #P0032@...#P0039@.

    • Show sent claim - set to also display those immunisations that have already been sent to AIR
    • Encounter Place - select an encounter place from the list to display immunisations only for a specific Encounter Place
    • Use Time Limit - by default, only records that are within the 2 year legal time limit imposed by Medicare Australia for electronically claimable services are displayed. Deselect to display all records up to 50 years old.
    • Minor ID - select a minor location ID from the list to display claims records for that location ID.
  2. Click Apply Filters.

Only those immunisations that meet the filter criteria are displayed.

To display all immunisations again, click Reset Filters.

AIR record uploads

After a service is completed, any immunisations with a valid AIR code are submitted to AIR automatically by Communicare without requiring further intervention, independently of any Medicare claims.

AIR record uploads cannot be initiated manually.

  • If an immunisation is marked as Performed at current encounter place, Communicare submits an AIR - General Immunisation Claim
  • If an immunisation is not marked as Performed at current encounter place, Communicare submits an AIR - History Immunisation Claim

AIR uploads are sent at the interval and time configured in CCareQueue_HIC.exe. By default, CCareQueue_HIC.exe runs every hour, daily 9:30am-8:00pm to process Medicare claims, and the AIR upload occurs at 2am. However, this can be configured to run weekly if required.

AIR upload statuses

Tip: Click Get Reports to force Communicare to check the processing of a upload.
The possible claim statuses are:
  • AIR Claim waiting in queue
  • Error: AIR General Immunisation not sent
  • Error: AIR History Immunisation not sent
  • AIR General Immunisation Sent
  • AIR History Immunisation Sent
Sometimes an AIR upload fails validation before it is sent. These are the common reasons why the status is set to Error: AIR General Immunisation not sent or Error: AIR History Immunisation not sent:
  • In the immunisation clinical item:
    • The dose given exceeds the maximum allowed by AIR for a course of immunisations for that vaccine
      Tip: The AIR records vaccine doses at the antigen level, not the vaccine brand. Notify the AIR of a dose number based on the number of previous doses of a particular antigen. For example, if the DTP vaccine Infanrix Hexa dose 1,2 and 3 are recorded on the AIR for an individual, and DTP vaccine Tripacel is given at 18 months, Tripacel should be recorded as dose 4, because it is the fourth of a DTP-containing vaccine.
    • There is no dose recorded in either the Dose (this course) or Dose number field
    • For vaccines that require a serial number, for example, Comirnaty, a valid number is missing from the Serial Number field
    • The serial number must not include an empty space or any of the following special characters: 
      @ $ ^ ` [ ] { }
  • In the patient's biographics:
    • The patient address contains PO Box or c/-
    • The patient locality is Other / elsewhere or has an invalid postcode
    • The patient address does not include an entry in the Line 1 field
    • The patient name includes characters other than A-Z characters, hyphens (without surrounding spaces), apostrophes, numerics and spaces
    • A current, valid Medicare card number is not recorded
    • The patient's sex is recorded as something other than Male or Female. For example, if the patient's sex is recorded in Communicare as Indeterminate, the error returned from AIR is Send AIR Failed at element: PatientGender, with a code 9202 which means Invalid value for data item. The data element does not comply with the values permitted or has failed a check digit check..
Tip: You can download a list of Medicare return codes from Services Australia - Medicare digital claiming return codes.

Viewing and editing immunisations

From the Claims Status (Online Claiming) > AIR Claims tab, you can edit immunisations that haven't yet been sent or view them if they have. Typically, you would edit immunisations that fail validation.

Select the immunisation you want to view or edit and select one of the following options:
  • Edit iconEncounter - click to open the service record so that you can edit the service associated with the immunisation
  • Patient details icon - click to edit patient details, including specifying or updating a Medicare number
  • Progress note icon - click to view the progress note associated with the immunisation
  • Print icon - click to print out a Medicare online claiming bulk bill assignment of benefit form for the selected patient
  • Admin notes icon - click to add an administrative note about the immunisation
  • Edit iconImmunisation - click to open the immunisation clinical item where you can edit any details or add missing information