Generally revise health utilization review laws

Insurers must honor prior authorization approvals for at least 90 days when an enrollee changes health plans, preventing disruption of care.

Retroactive denial of previously approved services is prohibited, except in cases of fraud, misrepresentation, nonpayment of premiums, or exhaustion of benefits.

Prescriptions written at discharge from inpatient care are exempt from prior authorization requirements and must be approved for at least 3 days if the medication costs $5,000 or less per day.

Insurers must accept and respond to prior authorization requests electronically using secure transmission methods.

Clarified rules regarding step therapy protocols, allowing enrollees to avoid repeating protocols if they previously used a drug in the same class and discontinued it for valid medical reasons.

Updated header formatting and bill numbering from 'SB 449.1' to 'SB0449.2'.

Changed the conflict resolution clause to explicitly state 'THIS ACT' is void if both House Bill 398 and this act are passed, replacing the previous reference to 'section 1 of House Bill 398'.

The bill number changed from LC 3200 to SB 449, and the list of primary sponsors was updated to include V. Ricci, C. Schomer, E. Buttre, J. Etchart, L. Deming, and J. Karlen.

The capitalization in the coordination section was adjusted to change 'HOUSE BILL 544' to 'House Bill 544' for consistency.

Page headers and footers were updated to indicate this is the 'Authorized Print Version - SB 449'.