Streamlining your thoracic and cardiovascular surgery medical billing practices with integrated PMS

Practice in Thoracic and cardiovascular surgery means expensive facilities that often need to be upgraded to clinical innovations. Despite such expensive cost outlays, continued shortage of physicians may still have allowed them to see more patients, thereby garnering revenues well over capital expenditure. But, severity of health care reforms and Medical Billing challenges has not allowed physicians in thoracic and cardiovascular practice to realize their dues fully. While Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance fee schedules have greatly been reduced these days, accountability in terms of coding compliance, meaningful use of information technology, and reporting under accountable care organization model (ACO) has increased beyond the control of traditional practice management. As a result health care practitioners, particularly thoracic and cardiovascular surgery practitioners may need to streamline their medical billing in order to remain financially healthy.

Primary prerequisite to streamline thoracic and cardiovascular surgery medical billing is to have competent and experienced billers and coders who are adept at applying correct ICD-CM, CPT, HCPCS Level II and modifier coding assignments to thoracic and cardiovascular surgical procedures; evaluation and management of documentation guidelines; Medicare billing rules and regulations on coding of surgical procedures performed by thoracic and cardiovascular surgeons; familiarity with medical terminology associated with Thoracic and Cardiovascular specialty; and proficiency in Thoracic & Cardiovascular anatomy and physiology.

Equally important is to have such billing staff oriented to electronic practice management systems that have effectively replaced paper and manual process of billing, coding, and submission of claims. The unique value proposition of an integrated practice management system is that allows physicians to streamline their medical billing and other administrative tasks without requiring the time and expenses of setting up their own IT architectures. Therefore, it is crucial that Thoracic & Cardiovascular Surgical practices chose practice management systems that are integrated with seamlessly integrated with electronic health records and medical billing software in order to streamline medical billing and other administrative functions. Further, it is imperative that such systems conform to Federal security requirements and HIPPA regulations.

Here is a list of capabilities that you seek while selecting an integrated practice management system for your Thoracic & Cardiovascular Surgical practice:

Can it process third-party payer claims with reduced occurrence of errors and realize claims within permissible time limit?

Whether it can accomplish insurance verification and authorizations?

Does it facilitate monitoring, and following up on denied claims and collections under account receivable status?

Is it capable of producing reports for audits and reporting requirement?

Is it flexible enough to adjust to operational requirements?

Is it scalable to suit your evolving operational size and volumes?

The significance of verifying your prospective practice management systems against the checklist stated above is that it saves you from making inadvertent decision. Thoracic & Cardiovascular surgical practices on the verge of streamlining their medical billing practices may even have to rely on external sources while migrating to integrated practice management systems. Medicalbillersandcoders.com – with resource capability and strategic partnership with credible practice management systems manufacturers and vendors – might just be the platform to engage with right choices for streamlining your Thoracic & Cardiovascular surgery medical billing, and expect:

To get your patient information transferred over secure software platforms, thereby conforming to HIPAA rules and regulations for patient health information and data transfer.

To have your bills accurately coded, billed, and processed electronically in time to be submitted to insurance carriers.

Expedite the process of claim realization, resubmission, follow-up and conversion of account receivables.

To be assisted with quality medical billing reports comprising of patient demographics, referrals, coding, insurance verifications, account receivables and collection.

And more importantly, show up as conforming to Meaningful Use of EHR, which not only saves you from being penalized but also help qualify for monetary incentives.

How Rising Usage of Thoracic Ultra-Sonography Would Prompt Physicians to Opt for External Medical Billing

How Rising Usage of Thoracic Ultra-Sonography Would Prompt Physicians to Opt for External Medical Billing The safety and precision factors associated with Thoracic ultrasonography have made it a more indispensable and preferred imaging modality to the traditional radiology imaging procedures that often have been criticized for compromising with patient safety and accuracy of diagnosis.

Thoracic ultrasonography, as a noninvasive imaging modality, has significant applications in pulmonary medicine, allowing the physician to diagnose a variety of thoracic disorders at the point of care. It has been found to be extremely useful in imaging of the chest wall, pleural space, diaphragms, and the lungs; lung consolidation, pleural-based masses and effusions, pneumothorax, and diaphragmatic dysfunction can now be accurately diagnosed and assessed.  Observation, palpation, percussion, and auscultation are key elements in the evaluation of any patient, and physicians seem to be better managing these disease processes with Thoracic ultrasonography. With so many noticeable advantages, it may not be surprising to see patients and physicians alike opting for Thoracic ultrasonography.

Just when physicians feel that they have found a way to appreciate their practice volumes with Thoracic ultrasonography, there is a parallel realization that charging, coding and claim realization may not be all that easy. They may come across a variety of billing and coding issues such as global fee, technical fee, and professional fee. And these fees may have to be billed in combination or isolation depending upon how and where utlrasnography services are offered –  if thoracic ultrasonography is performed in the hospital setting, all of the technical costs are absorbed by the institution, as the hospital owns the machine and provides the supplies required for scanning. The clinician receives payment only for the professional component of the procedure. In contrast, office-based thoracic ultrasonography allows reimbursement for both the technical and professional component, provided the pulmonary practice owns the ultrasound machine.

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Further, they should necessarily have to be conversant some of the crucial and high-yielding codes, such as: 

Code-76604 when real time image with documentation is generated for chest (including mediastinum)

Code-76942 when ultrasonography used to guide needle insertion with image documentation.

Code-75989 for guidance of drainage devices (chest tubes, tunneled catheters) that will stay in the patient for some period of time

76604-26 codes that allow professional component only

76942-26 codes that allow professional and 76942 that allows coding global component

The payout on these codes or reimbursement rates vary according to geographic area and insurer, thus the physicians need to be mindful of these geographic-specific and insurer-specific variations. With possible increase in ultrasonography cases, physicians may entirely find themselves occupied with clinical quality, with little time to manage complexities of charging, billing and reimbursement. Therefore, it might warrant the intervention of experts in ultrasonography medical billing and coding. Medicalbillersandcoders.com serves as an ideal platform for physicians seeking ultrasonography billing experts. We have ready access to a chosen pool of ultrasonography billing experts who can be entrusted with managing intricacies associated with ultrasonography medical fee charging, billing and reimbursement processes.

How Vital Is an Effective and Efficient Medical Billing and Coding in Preserving Thoracic Surgery Practice Profitability?

Thoracic surgical specialty is one of those priority specialties that have always been in high demand across the 50 states in the U.S., and the forecast is for an increased incidence of thoracic surgical cases. While practitioners in thoracic surgical specialty may continue to be optimistic about their future practice, constant clinical innovations and complexity of the procedures would still have to be taken care of.  Thoracic surgery often involves preoperative, operative, and surgical critical care of patients with problems within the chest. The magnitude of focus leaves physicians confined to clinical care alone, leaving them largely ignorant of finer aspects of Thoracic medical billing & coding, and reimbursement management.

A specialty as complex and critical as Thoracic surgery requires physicians to be conversant with the entire process of Thoracic medical billing, beginning with:

Ability to read and abstract physician office notes and operative notes to apply correct ICD-CM, CPT, HCPCS Level II and modifier coding assignments

Evaluation and management (both the 1995 and 1997 Documentation Guidelines)

Rules and regulations of Medicare billing including (but not limited to) incident to, eaching situations, shared visits, consultations and global surgery

Coding of surgical procedures performed

Knowledge of Medical terminology associated with Thoracic specialty

Complete proficiency in Thoracic Anatomy and physiology

They may further be required to:

Customize and generate HIPAA compliant claim codes as per situational needs that vary depending upon on patients’ health insurance coverage under Medicare, Medicaid, or private health insurance policies.

Create separate reports for diagnosis, treatment, and procedures.

Function in collaboration with major healthcare Insurances such as Medicare, Medicaid, and a host of private insurers such as Oxford, United, Aetna, Hip, No Fault, Medicaid, Humana, etc.

To be certified by certified by the AAPC (American Association of Professional Coders) and conform to coding norms as defined by AMA and CMS.

To be comfortable with generating medical codes on both paper and electronic formats. In addition, they should also be trained on medical billing and coding software to generate instant medical billing reports.

Have a thorough A/R management in place to monitor, track, and expedite the claims within the permissible time limit

Take up delayed or rejected claims with appropriate arbitrary agencies for possible remediation.

Thoracic surgery physicians, who happen to be more concerned about clinical quality, may not be too interested in doing medical billing, follow up, A/R and denial management by themselves. Thus, experts in Thoracic billing and coding may have a crucial role to play in ensuring unhindered practice revenues from reimbursements. Medicalbillersandcoders.com has a credible history in deploying medical billing resources for a variety of priority specialties across the 5O states in U.S. As Thoracic Surgical specialty is expected to be inundated with unprecedented patient influx, physicians may look forward to leverage their Thoracic medical billing with cost-efficient, technology-driven, and revenue-maximizing Thoracic medical billing practices from our chosen pool of Thoracic billing experts, accessible at all major clinical destinations in the U.S.

Employing Specialized Medical Billing to Maneuver Through Clinical and Operational Issues in 2013

The year 2013 is going to be quite significant to the U.S. health care industry in general and doctors in particular – it is the year when a host of health care reforms will be set in motion, and many clinical and operational experiments will get crystallized into norms to be complied with by the physician community. While they may have objectively been conceived to bring about transformational changes in clinical and operational spheres, the consensus amongst the doctors is that, along with noticeable clinical and operational efficiency, they may have to realign their medical billing practices to changing paradigm in order to remain operationally healthy.

Even as we start counting probable issues that can influence clinical sphere, cost of administering services, medical billing, and so forth, it is may be worthwhile having a glance at the watch list released by The Physicians Foundation, which is committed to focus on issues that surround physicians across the clinical destinations in the U.S. The watch list becomes credible in that it is derived from reliable reports, including the foundation’s 2012 Biennial Physician and Next Generation surveys.

One of the major issues that physicians will come to face in 2013 is the persistent apprehension with Affordable Care Act. While ACA may have been approved by the Federal Judiciary, and soon be mandatory in Medicare networks across the 50 states in the U.S., doctors are not still sure how they can operate under Accountable Care Organization model without having to compromise on their revenues as Medicare physician fee schedule is likely to be constricted and governed by independent payment advisory board.

Second, cost of medical care and patient distribution may get redefined from 2013 as smaller clinics are likely to become consolidated entities. Further, many independent doctors, in an effort to shield themselves from the impact of health care reforms, may even feel it worthwhile switching over large hospitals.  When such realignment starts dictating cost and patient distribution, many stand-alone practitioners may not be able carry on with constricted fees and patient visits.

Third, close on the heels is the possible induction of more than 30 million new patients into the nation’s healthcare systems. Doctors, whose volume is woefully short of the requisite, may still struggle more to provide quality care when the proposed new patients are accepted into health insurance backed (Medicare, Medicaid, and even private insurance policies) health care system.

Last, it is widely believed that doctors would lose the ability to independently decide on clinical & operational issues when they move into a consolidate system of health care delivery under ACO and other forms of shared models. It may not be an ideal scenario when doctors are deprived of their independent opinion on matters concerning clinical issues.

And, even if we are to believe that doctors will somehow navigate through clinical issues, administration and medical billing issues may not entirely be their known territories. That is why external medical billing intervention might just be the right injection. Medicalbillersandcoders.com has precisely been doing it admirably for more than a decade now. As physicians enter into a most momentous year in their professional experience, our resource-rich platform – known for facilitating instant, right, remedial, adaptive, and transformational medical billing solutions across the 50 states in U.S. – might just offer them the leverage to maneuver through the likely issues confronting them from 2013 onwards.

Will Outsourced Medical Billing Ease the Burden on Fewer Doctors Due to Healthcare Law?

The doctor-patient ratio has woefully been disproportionate across the 50 states in the U.S., and researchers believe that it may continue to be far from ideal and even worsen in the coming years:

Researchers have estimated that even in the absence of the health care reform law, the shortage of doctors would have exceeded 100,000 by 2025.

When the ACA is included, the Association of American Medical Colleges estimates that in 2015 the country will have 62,900 fewer doctors than needed.

This figure is expected to double by 2025 when the retirement of the baby boomers and the implementation of the ACA are in full force.

And, when you consider the recommendation of the recent health care law authorizing the induction of 30 million Americans into the health insurance coverage, it may simply be an overwhelming proposition both clinically and operational. Majority of the new inductees are believed to be baby boomers, whose medical needs tend to be complex; Medicare officials predict that enrollment will surge to 73.2 million in 2025.

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While the patient population has constantly been increasing, there have not been enough doctors in the pool to respond to the clinical demand. Even though medical schools have seen a steady increase in enrollment, the problem of trained and job-ready graduates still persists. Moreover, younger doctors are more selective about their work-hours. And, the fact that about a third of the nation’s doctors are well beyond the age of 55 and fast approaching retirement has not helped the cause at all.

Another possible reason behind shortage of doctors could be disparity in compensation to physicians – a study by the Medical Group Management Association found primary care doctors make about $200,000 a year while specialists often earn twice as much. As a result, the proportion of medical students choosing to enter primary care has declined steadily in the past 15 years.

While The Obama Administration has pledged to ease the shortage, it may not entirely possible to respond to the demand of around 45,000 primary care doctors by the next decade; the proposed increase in Medicaid’s primary care payment rates in 2013 and 2014 may at best encourage an increase of around 5000 primary care doctors by 2020.

The trend is certainly bad from patients’ perspective as there may not be sufficient doctors around to deliver quality medical care. And, for doctors it could mean stretching the limits clinically, and submitting far too many medical claims with multiple health insurance carriers. While physicians should continue to shoulder unprecedented clinical responsibilities till such time when the doctor-patient ratio balance evens out, they can at least control and maximize their reimbursements with external medical billing.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com has been physicians’ choice during times of clinical and operational crisis. Our nation-wide affiliation with expert medical billing resources help physicians chose and engage medical billers either on contingency or on-going basis. As the new health care law is likely to enhance clinical and operational responsibilities, physicians’ could easily off load their burden to our pool of credible and competent medical billers.

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How ‘Malpractice Insurance’ Can Save You From Drowning Financially During Malpractice Law Suits

Physicians, who are generally known for highest professional integrity, often have to live with the tag of ‘malpractice’ despite clinical errors being unintentional. While patients’ have every right to get indemnified for the grievance, physicians’ sole choice of protection against monetary liability – which may vary from few thousand to many thousand dollars depending on the severity of the clinical error – happens to be 'malpractice liability’. Thus, whether you like or not, malpractice insurance is now more a necessity than an option. Moreover, malpractice insurance often needs to chosen carefully depending on the context in which physicians find themselves in –  physicians employed in a hospital may need to be insured differently from those who may be operating their clinics. Because of these inherent priorities, physicians have to aware and knowledgeable of the malpractice insurance that best safeguards them against any eventuality. 

It may be remembered that professional liability insurance can be availed as either ‘occurrence’ or ‘claims-made’ policy. While most of the policies offered by the insurers are claims-made, you can still avail opt for occurrence policies, which are relatively costlier than claims-made policies.

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Claims-Made Policies

In claims-made insurance, carrier is obligated to provide coverage only for the incidents that occur and get reported during the time of your insurance being active. Therefore, it is necessary that both the incident and the filing of the claim happen while the policy is in effect.

Suppose you discontinue with a claims-made policy, and get sued for a malpractice during the time when your claims-made was still in force, you will not be covered against any such suit unless you have kept alive your original claim-made policy with ‘tail coverage’, the term used for extended reporting endorsement. Despite tail coverage being expensive – as far as three times the value of an annual premium – it is often recommended to be active with tail coverage for any claims that could be reported years after they first happened. Tail coverage is also beneficial to physicians who change over to private practice from hospital employment where employer may have been covering them with claims-made policies alone.

Occurrence Policies

On the other hand, occurrence policies are more protective in nature, offering lifetime coverage for the incidents the incidents gets reported long after the expiry of policies. Suppose, you are sued in 2013 for a malpractice that took five years earlier when you were covered under an occurrence policy, you still are entitled to be covered under the your erstwhile occurrence policy even though it has expired.  But a major drawback with occurrence insurance is that they are apparently too costly to be borne by smaller physicians.

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While physicians may possible chose among the forms of malpractice insurance, malpractice   liability is something that is quite inescapable. The alarming increase professional liability claims does quite vindicate the significance of having some form of malpractice insurance. While it may not restore the possible loss of credibility of goodwill of your clinical practices, it could surely prevent you from drowning financially. Therefore, your choice and quantum of malpractice insurance should necessarily be tailored to your practice specialty, practice location, ability to offer collateral security, and more importantly according to state legal requirements under which you are operating.

However, you may find it hard to reconcile these multiple considerations, and possible be better off with some external advice availing malpractice insurance. Medicalbillersandcoders.com, which holds the distinction of being a premier platform for sourcing medical billing solutions, is equally adept at suggesting and securing ‘malpractice insurance’ for physicians either employed in a hospital setting or practicing independently. Our broad base of experts, knowledgeable with various malpractice insurance policies and state-specific rules can be relied upon for implementing the insurance policies that best suit your need and capability.

The Significance of Responding to Cardiology Billing and Coding Dynamics

Cardiology is one those specialties that generally perform high-cost diagnostic and curative services, and getting reimbursed for such significant services means conclusive and convincing cardiology medical billing – adhering to cardiology codes, compliance standards and coding rules. Cardiologist, who used to be comfortable with a fewer codes and compliance standards and coding rules, are now required to be abreast with period changes in cardiology codes, compliance standards and coding rules. Amongst these evolving changes, cardiologists need to be aware of acceptability of the codes assigned, modifiers to be attached, medical necessity of performing and coding a procedure, component coding, and so on.

Acceptability of the codes assigned

Contrary to overlapping cardiology codes in the past, CMS has comes up with an exhaustive list of cardiology codes, meaning virtually an independent and appropriate code for every cardiology procedure. Therefore, Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance companies can easily verify and ascertain whether or not you have aptly coded your procedures. Moreover, attaching a lower-paying code for a relatively costlier procedure does not make sense at all.

Apart from learning evolving coding numbers and their correct assignment, cardiologists should also familiar with changes that have been introduced in codes relevant to heart catheterization, revascularization, observation services and more. Many existing codes have undergone revisions, including iliac repair, angioplasty, non-coronary stent placement, wearable ECG recording, and non-invasive physiologic changes. As of now, while billing for cardiology procedures:

• Cardiologists are required report most non-congenital procedures with a single code
• Catheterization coded for non-congenital studies cover injections, imaging supervision, interpretation and report.
• Imaging supervision, interpretation and report are included with the injection procedure and cannot be reported separately in the case of all cardiac catheterization procedures
• Cardiology-specific codes such as 93451, 93456, and 93503 are not allowed to be attached with modifier 51.

Medical necessity of performing and medical necessity of performing and coding a procedure

In certain cases, insurance payors may contest the medical necessity of certain procedures undertaken by cardiologists. Therefore, it crucial that cardiologists substantiate the necessity of those procedures that have sent coded. Otherwise, reimbursements for those procedures may be rejected for lack of sufficient proof.

Component Coding 

 

Cardiologists’ services may often involve certain technical components, and there are specific coding ruling depending on the criticality of each of such technical components. A higher technical component should always be accompanied by a higher value code so as to maximize the eventual reimbursement. In cases where there are several technical components involved on the same, the lowest component should be singled out to prevent the mandatory 25 percent deduction being charged to any other higher paying technical components.

All of these evolving cardiology codes, standards, and rules may limit cardiologists’ ability to realize their reimbursement in full. Therefore, irrespective of you being interventional cardiologists, diagnostic cardiologists, electro-physiologists, nuclear cardiologists or cardiovascular/ cardiothoracic physicians, you may eventually need an effective revenue cycle management solution in place that is integrated with the right technology, processes and people to respond to Cardiology Billing and Coding dynamics.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com offers and mediates resource deployment for integrated solutions in medical billing Revenue Cycle Management to diverse medical practices across the 50 states in the U.S. Our capability in cardiology medical billing is driven by a nation-wide resource base of expert cardiology medical billers and coders familiar with cardiology-specific medical billing, technology, and processes. With access to such talent-pool of professionals, cardiologists across the U.S. should be able to respond to cardiology billing and coding dynamics.

Ascertaining Cardiologists’ Medical Billing Needs Even as They Migrate From Private Practices to Hospitals

Till recently, cardiologists who were happy with their private practices have suddenly started exploring avenues to align themselves with hospitals. The change has been so dramatic that already around 15 percent of cardiologists across the U.S. have left their private practices in search of more secure positions in large clinics and hospitals. As per reliable industry sources, the exodus might well cross 70 percent in a couple of years. This shift may have not come about without valid reasons – increased regulations on private practices, stricter reimbursement environment, and a series of healthcare reforms calling for healthcare to be made more affordable may have triggered the swift turn of events.

Impact of revised cardiology fee schedules Like in other clinical disciplines, cardiologists too are feeling the heat of significant cuts in their fee schedules. The recent revision to cardiology fee schedule is so hard on cardiologists that it is virtually difficult even to operate on minimal operational margins. While a certain double digit cut to reimbursement from Medicare is expected, there is also apprehension that private payors may also follow suit. The consolation from the likely swell in patient numbers may not still be able to off-set revenues losses completely.

Stricter federal regulations on private practices Although the recent health care reforms are generally aimed at optimizing the quality of medical care across the nation, private practices may feel rules and regulation emanating from such reforms to be rather harsh or difficult to comply with. Affordable care model, mandatory EHR compliance, and the ensuing ICD-10 billing regime may be both exhausting and expensive. Therefore, cardiologists in private practice may deem it apt to mitigate such burden by abandoning their private practices, and practice in hospitals where they focus solely on cardiology efficiency.

Lure of hospitals Certain hospitals too are laying out baits to cardiologists with promise of lucrative benefits and vertical promotions. Hospitals feel that they can improve the quality with a large pool of experts under one umbrella. And, as for the cardiologists, it may be an opportunity to expand their professional expertise without additional overheads.

Immunity from administration burden One of the significant reasons behind cardiologists opting for larger clinics and hospitals is the perceived burden of administration, which is likely to be even more laborious in the aftermath of the recent health care reforms and the ensuing ICD-10 billing regime

While this migration may clinically and operationally be prudent for cardiologists who do not want to risk practicing amidst volatile conditions, it may not be good for the industry which has always thrived on proper mix of sole practitioners, clinics, and large cardiology specialty hospitals. The fear with this unprecedented exodus is that it may deprive instant access to primary cardiology points. Therefore, cardiologists need to be assured of operationally viable practices. And, there is no better way of doing this than easing cardiology medical billing burden of their shoulders.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com has been a premier source for medical billing, coding, and revenue cycle management services. Practices of varied sizes and disciplines across the 50 states in the U.S. have found our services to be reassuring at times of major operational dilemma. And, now at a time, when cardiologist across the U.S. are losing faith in private practices, our cardiology-specific billing, coding, and RCM solutions may just help them focus on their clinical priorities without being unduly worried about operational issues.

Eliminating Skilled Nursing Facilities’ (snfs) Medical Billing Complication

Medical billing for Skilled Nursing Facilities has undergone metamorphic changes ever since the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 came into effect 1998. One of the significant requirements under the new legislation is that Skilled Nursing Facilities are not permitted to unbundle services that are administered by contracted healthcare providers. As a result, most of the services provided to Medicare beneficiaries are to be bundled together and billed by SNFs under Prospective Payment System (PPS) in one consolidated claim. The SNF concerned is then responsible to pay for contracted services out of the per diem rate that it earns for caring a Medicare beneficiary.

While this imposition may have helped reduce potential fraud and abuse due to double billing by healthcare providers, SNFs have certainly had a hard time in understanding:

What services are covered under consolidated billing What is billable under Medicare Part A What is billable under Medicare Part B State-specific Medicaid protocols and methodologies for SNFs Medical Billing Commercial health insurance plans and their dynamics

Though most the services offered to a resident under Medicare Part A are allowed to be included in the consolidated billing, certain services deemed costly or requiring specialization must not be appended with the consolidated billing. Generally, physician's professional services; certain dialysis-related services, including covered ambulance transportation to obtain the dialysis services; certain ambulance services, including transporting the beneficiary to the SNF initially, transporting from the SNF at the end of the stay (other than when involving transfer to another SNF), and transporting round-trip during the stay temporarily offsite to receive dialysis or certain types of intensive or emergency outpatient hospital services; erythropoietin for certain dialysis patients; certain chemotherapy drugs; certain chemotherapy administration services; radioisotope services; and customized prosthetic devices are excluded.

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The services that are excluded under Medicare Part A should be billed under Medicare Part B, which allows medically necessary services to be reimbursed under ‘Fee For Service’ (FFS) system. It is possible that SNFs may have not entirely been thorough with these procedures, resulting in billing inefficiencies.

Even as most of the SNFs need to bill Medicare Part A and Part B, there could be SNFs that operate under state-specific Medicaid ambit. And, because each of the 50 states in the U.S. may its own Medicaid program, SNFs should invariably have to bill under their state-specific Medicaid rules and regulations. This regions-specific compliance too may have had a considerable impact on SNFs billing.

Outside the public health insurance plans, SNFs encounter the second largest health insurance providers in commercial health insurance carriers. While CMS has set a uniform standard for reimbursements across the board, commercial plays may still have their own individualistic methods of SNF reimbursement. Thus, SNFs medical billing may have suffered from having to adapt to these multi-payer dynamics.

These SNF-related medical billing concerns necessitate the significance of SNF medical billing specialists that certified and competent to maneuver SNF medical billing executions under Medicare Part A, Part B, state-specific Medicaid programs, and commercial health insurance environment. Medicalbillersandcoders.com has been versatile enough to solve medical billing issues regardless of location, size, or medical disciplines; practices across the 50 states in the U.S. continue to rely on us for remedial and transformational medical billing services. With our nation-wide resource-base adept at multi-component and multi-payer health insurance environment, SNFs should be able to put their medical billing complication to rest.

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Reforming Nursing Facilities Medical Billing Amidst Dwindling Reimbursements

Nursing facilities across the U.S. have somehow endured a series of Medicare/Medicaid cuts thus far, but the latest move by CMS to reduce reimbursement for so-called Medicare “bad debt” – Medicare co-payments not made by beneficiaries or state Medicaid programs – may bring them on the threshold of a major operational crisis. The new legislation has effectively brought down reimbursement rate for bad debts to 65 percent from what used to be 100 percent of unpaid co-payments under dual-eligible beneficiaries, and 70 percent for other Medicare bad debts. With most of the nursing facilities encountering dual-eligibles (Medicare & Medicaid beneficiaries), and federal law allowing Medicaid programs to opt out of making co-payments in most cases, it may be difficult to sustain quality and operationally viable nursing services amidst shrinking Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement rates.

Therefore, it is not unusual for nursing facilities adopting contingency plans to safeguard their operational viability. Amongst several options available to nursing facilities, the following seem to have been deemed strategically more sensible:

Laying off direct service staff Many nursing facilities operators believe that they would be able to off-set the effect of irrevocable bad debts with a reduction in their direct service staff. While they may be able to save considerable overheads, they may also be limiting their ability to sustain service quality. Putting new hiring on hold With limited scope for generating or increasing practice revenues, it may be difficult for nursing facilities operators expand their staff beyond their capacity. That is why most of them are inclined to putting new hiring on hold, and optimize operational efficiency with existing capacity. Here again, they may either be limiting their scope of operation or quality against a likely increase in Medicare or Medicaid patients. Pruning benefits Another plan that may increasingly be adopted is ‘pruning employment-related benefits’ – bonus, increments, promotion, and other amenities. While it may help substantially reduce cost, you could be harming staff’s morale and motivation. Deferring or cancelling expansion plans Reduction in reimbursements may curtail nursing facilities ability to expand with new ventures, and be forced to continue with current capacities despite demand generated by growing Medicare or Medicaid population.

While these plans may be effective to a certain extent, they will certainly be limiting nursing facilities’ ability to sustain quality, motive staff, and look beyond myopic operational strategies. That is why, rather than protective plans, operators would do well to explore alternatives that can keep their facilities responsive to quality and growth demands. Medical Billing is the area which has answers to most of the operational issues. Therefore, operators should look at making their nursing facility medical billing as effective and efficient as possible. Significantly, operators will need to align their billing practices to Medicare/Medicaid’s policy on reimbursing bad debts from disowned co-payments or deductibles.

Medicalbillingandcoders.com remains the most comprehensive source for medical billing solutions, more so for Medicare and Medicaid billing. With a resource base of medical billing experts spread across the 50 states in the U.S., nursing facilities can look forward to instant, effective, and efficient nursing facilities medical billing that can help them sustain quality and grow with evolving demand for nursing facilities.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

The Value of Outsourcing Cardiology Specialty Billing Amidst Changes to Medicare Reimbursement Rates

Any revision in Medicare reimbursement rates will have a direct impact on physicians’ medical billing, and cardiologists are not immune to the effects of frequent changes in Medicare reimbursement rates, announced by The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) from time to time. While cardiologists or their billers could anticipate the extent of earlier revisions with a fair degree of accuracy, they might not have imagined what they would be encountering in 2013 – as per CMS would have to be prepared for a 2 percent cut over and above the possible 26.5 percent cut to fix Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) formula. In addition to these general revisions, sweeping changes in rules governing evaluation of coders for certain high percentage cardio-vascular procedures, multiple procedure payment reduction, PQRS and e-prescribing, and value-based modifiers may potentially squeeze cardiologists’ revenues or operational margins.

One of the major changes that may hit cardiologists hard is the creation of new codes and payment levels for certain complex yet frequently encountered procedures. These new evaluation codes could potentially reduce payments from 20 to 27 percent depending on procedures. While representatives are negotiating with CMS for a more rational evaluation system, cardiologists or cardiology specialty billing will continue to be affected till such time when it may be revisited.

Another major concern comes from the CMS’ scheme for implementing a multiple procedure payment reduction to cardiovascular services. This could mean a reduction as high as 25 percent on the technical component of a service relatively less expensive than services performed on the same day. While this may not apply to office visits, most of the cardiovascular diagnostic and therapeutic services that happen to administer multiple services on the same day will certainly have to forgo a major chunk of their reimbursements.

As usual there would be bonus or penalty depending on compliance or non-compliance with PQRS and e-Prescribing – CMS has already made clear that cardiologists will receive 0.5 percent bonus for successfully participation in PQRS, and also be vulnerable to 1.5 percent penalty or reduction for non-compliance PQRS and e-Prescribing standards.

And, value-based modifier that adjusts payment for quality and cost of care could either enhance or decrease the eventual payouts to cardiology practices. While this system is not yet mandatory, you never cardiologists may soon be asked to be part of it under Account Care Organization (ACO) model.

Amidst these sweeping payments changes, cardiologists could be vulnerable to revenue losses, which in turn might jeopardize their sustenance and growth plans. This concern necessitates the significance of cardiology specialty billing that is competent enough to keep cardiologists’ revenue health positive despite the inevitable Medicare cuts.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com has successfully mediated physicians’ medical billing outsourcing decisions in the past; majority of Medical Billing Practices in varied disciplines across the 50 states in the U.S. have made use of our platform to source the right and competent medical billing professionals. Given our equally commendable cardiology-specific billing experience in the past during times of critical medical billing issues, cardiologists should be able to respond instantly and amicably to these Medicare-dictated billing challenges, and keep their practices clinically and operationally efficient.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Complications in Clinical Documentation Leading to Inaccurate Billing Codes

Clinical documentation is a need that threads through the entire lifecycle of an inpatient treatment episode. The clinical documentation specialist checks the documents of a patient before or within 24 to 28 hours of admission to assess various aspects of the patient’s condition, reviews documents every two to three days, during patient stay, to check their progress, accuracy and assign proper diagnosis related group (DRG). Based on assessment, the clinical documentation specialist also sends feedback to the physician who corrects things if necessary before the documentation is used for preparing reimbursement claims.

As is evident, clinical documentation requires extensive documentation of treatment procedures together with their relationship to be used for preparing reimbursement claims. Seen from a reimbursement claim standpoint, anything that’s not documented doesn’t exist and such are coding complexities that the presence or absence of any fact in documentation affects the choice of code later, making it either accurate or inaccurate. This has become more so since the expected implementation of ICD-10-CM.

ICD-10-CM is much more nuanced than ICD-9-CDM. Whereas ICD-9-CDM included 59 codes for diabetes, ICD-10-CM has more than 200 codes for it. Additionally, for diabetes, ICD-10-CM has added a new provision called ‘poorly controlled’ to the already existing provisions under ICD-9-CDM, controlled and uncontrolled. 

Similarly, ICD-10-CM has also increased the number of categories for injuries to cover a larger set of possibilities and arrest the nuances of a wider range of physical specifications of an injury. For example, apart from various details to ascertain the character of an encounter, the ICD-10-CM requires the coder to code the size and depth of an injury. Also, ICD-10-CM contains multiple combination codes to account for relationships between various conditions. After wading through these details, it is not very pleasant to be reminded that the source of these codes is clinical documentation.

Effective clinical documentation requires a grid-like structure underneath the day-to-day healthcare activities involved in an inpatient treatment episode which will arrest medical details, record them and pass them through various phases of the treatment terminating with the discharge of the patient. This process has to be a mix of human effort (to interact with various parties involved) and technology (to record details and facilitate coordination among various specialties – healthcare and otherwise – that interact during the course of a treatment).

MBC’s Revenue Management Consulting can help you with this by performing a thorough analysis of your revenue management cycle and lubricating various points of interaction it has with other areas of operation ensuring smooth flow of data. This involves identifying gaps in your process and addressing them by replacing, if necessary, old software applications with new ones, blocking areas of revenue leakage and identifying areas of staff training.

Medicalbillerandcoders.com, the largest consortium of billers and coders in the US, has helped medical practices improve their finances by its Outsourced Billing and coding services which involve development of accurate electronic billing, intricate procedure coding, electronic filling of claims and a multi-layered application process - collectively resulting in reduced claim denials and enhanced core-business focus.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Tackling Reimbursement Challenges posed by Inpatient Coding with Professional Medical Billing and Coding!

Clinical documentation is a need that threads through the entire lifecycle of an inpatient treatment episode. The clinical documentation specialist checks the documents of a patient before or within 24 to 28 hours of admission to assess various aspects of the patient’s condition, reviews documents every two to three days, during patient stay, to check their progress, accuracy and assign proper diagnosis related group (DRG). Based on assessment, the clinical documentation specialist also sends feedback to the physician who corrects things if necessary before the documentation is used for preparing reimbursement claims.

As is evident, clinical documentation requires extensive documentation of treatment procedures together with their relationship to be used for preparing reimbursement claims. Seen from a reimbursement claim standpoint, anything that’s not documented doesn’t exist and such are coding complexities that the presence or absence of any fact in documentation affects the choice of code later, making it either accurate or inaccurate. This has become more so since the expected implementation of ICD-10-CM.

ICD-10-CM is much more nuanced than ICD-9-CDM. Whereas ICD-9-CDM included 59 codes for diabetes, ICD-10-CM has more than 200 codes for it. Additionally, for diabetes, ICD-10-CM has added a new provision called ‘poorly controlled’ to the already existing provisions under ICD-9-CDM, controlled and uncontrolled. 

Similarly, ICD-10-CM has also increased the number of categories for injuries to cover a larger set of possibilities and arrest the nuances of a wider range of physical specifications of an injury. For example, apart from various details to ascertain the character of an encounter, the ICD-10-CM requires the coder to code the size and depth of an injury. Also, ICD-10-CM contains multiple combination codes to account for relationships between various conditions. After wading through these details, it is not very pleasant to be reminded that the source of these codes is clinical documentation.

Effective clinical documentation requires a grid-like structure underneath the day-to-day healthcare activities involved in an inpatient treatment episode which will arrest medical details, record them and pass them through various phases of the treatment terminating with the discharge of the patient. This process has to be a mix of human effort (to interact with various parties involved) and technology (to record details and facilitate coordination among various specialties – healthcare and otherwise – that interact during the course of a treatment).

MBC’s Revenue Management Consulting can help you with this by performing a thorough analysis of your revenue management cycle and lubricating various points of interaction it has with other areas of operation ensuring smooth flow of data. This involves identifying gaps in your process and addressing them by replacing, if necessary, old software applications with new ones, blocking areas of revenue leakage and identifying areas of staff training.

Medicalbillerandcoders.com, the largest consortium of billers and coders in the US, has helped medical practices improve their finances by its Outsourced Billing and coding services which involve development of accurate electronic billing, intricate procedure coding, electronic filling of claims and a multi-layered application process - collectively resulting in reduced claim denials and enhanced core-business focus.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Solving the ‘Secondary Insurance’ puzzle at your medical practice

Care providers encounter patients with more than one level of health insurance coverage – a secondary insurance to complement primary insurance. While secondary insurance has considerably reduced patients’ out-of-pocket expenses and facilitated treatment plans outside primary coverage, billing for two-levels of insurance coverage has not been that easy. Even as certain secondaries to Medicare are enabled with automatic crossover to Blue Cross and Blue Shield and require no additional pursuance, majority of big and small private insurance plans continue to be unlinked with Medicare or Medicaid primary coverage. It is this isolation of secondary plans from primary that makes billing secondary insurance more difficult.

Irrespective of whether primary insurance is automatically linked to secondary insurance, it is the responsibility of care providers to arrange for co-ordination. Often, it is the insurance verification, billing, and follow up department that takes up the responsibility of coordination of benefits. Strangely, a large of proportion of relatively smaller secondary bills is never pursued or delayed till they become ineligible to be reimbursed. The collective value of such omitted secondary bills may be thousands of dollars per physicians. Therefore, with so much of hard-earned practice revenues going unrealized, physicians need to investigate and formulate corrective measures to follow up and realize secondary bills in time.

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One of the primary steps to monitor secondary bills is to have access to your patient accounts and system reports that show balances and your aging out Secondary Insurance Account Receivables (A/Rs). If you see certain bills approaching or just about to cross 90-day limit, it should be alerted immediately to your billing department for immediate follow up with secondary insurance carriers. Second, more than alerting your billing coordinating department of aging secondary bills, you should try to extract reasons for delay in reimbursements, and advice your staff for corrective measures based on the facts responsible for such delay. Third, once you have found out aging secondary bills, and advised your billing department to follow up with requisite modification or proof, it is important that they are pursued within the stipulated time limit, usually within 90-days from the date of billing. Last, it is always good to have a periodic review of your billing practices, particularly secondary insurance bills. Periodicity may range depending on the volume of secondary bills or ideally once every month. Review is an apt way to monitor the progress on secondary claims, and keep your practice’s financials healthy. In addition to challenges mentioned above, secondary insurance may have policy-specific, provider-specific, and region-specific demands. And, if you happen to be a care provider dealing with multiple insurance networks and operating across multiple clinical destinations in the U.S., you may have to be conversant with these diverse requirements. It is these multiple challenges that warrant the intervention of an external medical agency in your internal medical billing practices.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com has traditionally been care providers’ first choice in medical billing and coding; care providers of varied sizes and disciplines across the 50 states in the U.S. have found our services catalytic to their clinical and operational efficiency. And, at a time when they need their secondary billing mediated more than ever before, our resourcefulness – competent billing professionals with credentials in maximizing secondary insurance reimbursements – in secondary billing should be comforting.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Pre-empting malpractice liability risk with superior EHR systems

Electronic Health Record system (EHRs), which is the next order in clinical and operational documentation, is perhaps one of the significant technology additions to have happened to the health care industry. While care providers seem to have been convinced of its ability to elevate clinical and operational efficiency to a new level, they may still be inheriting malpractice liability risk more than ever before. Amongst many things that are intrinsic to EHR system, transition, design, implementation, application, and control issues threaten physicians’ immunity against lawsuits with respect to breach of HIPAA-mandated patient privacy and security.

As physicians begin to transit from manual to EHR-managed data centers, patient-specific data may be vulnerable to proliferation, exclusion, or faulty conversion during the process of transfer from paper to electronic medium. As a result of this inappropriate conversion, patients’ clinical management may suffer from inaccurate clinical decisions. When patients’ care gets compromised on account of such inapt transition, physicians will certainly be held accountable legally. Therefore, it is important to undertake data transition comprehensively as well as have an EHR system that can entirely accommodate such data transfer.

More than being liable for lacking in data conversion, it is the choice your EHR design, customization, and implementation process that could either make or break your case – those EHR systems that tend to deviate from HIPAA’s requirements may spell trouble for physicians who happen to own them or may be opting for such EHR platforms without knowing the eventual consequences. Therefore, it is essential that you exercise caution before deciding on an EHR platform – it is not the price or somebody else’s provocation that should drive your decision but how far you can sustain integrity in clinical documentation.

Significantly, physicians may have to contend with control and security issues – with EHR systems chances of data proliferation, hacking, and unauthorized access are going to increase. Physicians – who are generally non-inquisitive of data coming in from EHR channels – may not entirely be informed of adverse happenings at their EHR systems. Therefore, more than being happy with implementation, it is important that you monitor the functioning of your EHR platform on an on-going-basis. It is also important that you commission a support staff that can conduct and protect EHR operations as required by HIPAA mandate.

Though a bill that protects providers from malpractice and other liability (if they happen to use certified EHRs) is being contemplated on, physicians would still have to continue to safeguard integrity and the accuracy of the patient’s medical record till then.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com is essentially helping out hospital management or physicians practices that may be vulnerable to EHR-specific malpractice liability risk. The significant advantage of partnering with us is our ability to leverage our tactical knowledge in EHR implementation with technology alliances with some of the best EHR manufacturers. More than getting your EHR systems customized, it is our catalytic role in assisting transition to EHR-enabled clinical and operational documentation that is instrumental in our being a leading consortium across the 50 states in the U.S.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Managing Variable Healthcare Data with the Help of a Medical Billing Service

Although healthcare data is presumably highly significant to clinical efficiency, its application is not limited to clinical circle alone – medical billing, operational efficiency, contribution to clinical research and macro healthcare policies are equally dependent on healthcare data. Therefore, the primary raw data collected needs to be processed and tailored-made to serve these diverse purposes. While we may have come a long way from what used be generic data computing systems to healthcare-centric data management systems of today, questions still remain as to their ability to retain, secure, and serve the purposes for which they are 

relied upon.

This primary concern brings us to contemplate on data warehousing techniques that can necessitate the broad range of data-related utilities, such as tracking orders, recording vital signs, admitting/discharging/transferring patients, aiding reference, sending bills, and helping in collaborative exchange of healthcare data across clinical and operational eco-system – care providers, patients, insurance carriers, research bodies, and the Federal Government. While technology vendors have made available multiple versions of data warehousing models, care providers and all the external stakeholders still doubtful of them being fully responsive to ‘Meaningful Use’ of healthcare data.

Even as the problem persists with understanding variable healthcare data, care providers can still persuade manufacturers, vendors, and implementing agencies to evolve technology platforms that best serve providers’ internal data requirements as well contribute to external stakeholders’ data necessities. More than the mere architecture of the platforms, it is the utility-factor that needs to be well-defined and agreed upon before engaging with your prospective manufacturers or vendor. While we emphasize the need for customizing healthcare data centers’ architecture and delivery in sync with variable health care data utilities, current EHR platforms available in the market offer somewhat near-perfect options – today’s EHR platforms are believed to enable variable health care data utilities such as electronic medical records generation, billing, coding, operational functions, e-prescriptions, and a host of clinical and operational utilities.

While care providers may be able to better understand and manage variable health care data demands with these latest EHR platforms, they may still need to assess their prospective vendors’ ability to come up with customization that best supports their unique data needs. Notwithstanding their ability to assess intrinsic and potential data requirements, they, being physicians with essentially clinical care as their focus, may be well advised to avail services of medical agencies that best understand such critical healthcare data issues.

Medicalbillersandcoders.com has a tradition of mediating clinical and operational transformation on behalf of care providers. And, at a time when variable healthcare data management has become critical to clinical and operational efficiency, our broad resource-base of medical billing experts across the 50 states and their substantial experience in managing healthcare data centers for practices of varied sizes and disciplines should augur well for the future of variable healthcare data management in particular, and the nation’s healthcare delivery at large.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

EHR As a Means to Better Co-Ordinate and Control Care Processes

The success of health care has always been determined by how best care providers are able to coordinate the care processes across the clinical cycle – right from the time patients are admitted till they are pronounced cured. While clinical decision often lies with the primary physicians, clinical management may be divided among several departments or intervening specialists depending upon the complexities of clinical cases. Each clinical constituent may have specific, limited interactions with the patient and, depending on his/her area of expertise, may come up with his/her own view of the patient. While each of such views contribute to the ultimate clinical outcome, they information largely remains fragmented into disconnected facts and clusters of symptoms. As a result, clinical decision-makers are increasingly reliant on systems that keep disjointed clinical views into a cohesive clinical data.

Just as internet and web medium continues to evolve newer systems of care co-ordination, EHR is thought upon as the best technology system ever. While there could be arguments in favor of or against EHR as means to control clinical process, there is little doubt as to its ability to decrease the fragmentation of care by improving care coordination. EHRs have the potential to integrate and organize patient health information and facilitate its instant distribution among all authorized providers involved in a patient's care. With a well-networked EHR across the clinical continuum, care provider can expect:

superior integration among providers by improved information sharing to monitor and control the effect of medication to seek entry at point of care or off-site consistency of data, order sets, and care plans helping to implement common treatment of patients using evidence-based medicine gain access to experts for rural health care providers by sharing best practices and allowing for specialized care through telemedicine, have population management trended data and treatment and outcome studies, be armed with more convenient, faster, and simpler disease management

These multiple utilities promise to be a positive influence on health care quality and convenience. Amongst a series of EHR-enables advantages, providers will primarily be benefited with

Instant access to patient records from inpatient and remote locations for more coordinated, efficient care Superior decision support, clinical alerts, reminders, and medical information Performance-improving tools, real-time quality reporting Clear, complete documentation that facilitates accurate coding and billing Ready interfaces with labs, registries, and other EHRs Improved, safer, and more reliable prescribing

Providers, who are always dictated by clinical excellence, should welcome EHR as a means to enhance primarily clinical efficiency as well as operational efficiency at large. While internal staff can be acquainted with the functioning of EHR, implementation of EHR need necessarily be done by experts. Medicalbillersandcoders.com – who has been the first to mediate with critical processes and systems on behalf of care providers – have the experience and expertise to enable care providers with decision-supportive EHR systems. Our resource base, spread across the 50 states in the U.S., is capable of customizing EHR systems in sync with your practice sizes and disciplines.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Does Expanding Outpatient Physicians Really Help Stabilize Your Hospital Revenues?

Hospitals that hitherto have been troubled with in-patient operational losses may just have found a solution in outpatient mode. Contrary to stagnant inpatient volumes and revenues, outpatient volumes seem to have picked up in recent years. As a result operational revenues at hospitals seem to be firming up. It is also worthwhile to be informed of some interesting statistics unearthed by the research agencies – Fitch’s research has found the average operating margin to have shifted from 2.6% in 2010 to 2.7% in 2011 while Moody’s have estimated it to be hovering around 2.5%.

While outpatient mode may have marginally helped offset inpatient downturn, it is expected that hospitals’ outpatient windows will further gain from steady decline in inpatient cases – the decline in patient volumes, which previously was in sub-decimal, seems to be heading towards double-digit figure (prominent research agencies currently estimate it to be around 9%). Coupled with this dip in inpatient volumes, the recent health care reforms may force hospitals to operate at negligible profit margins. With so much pressure behind, hospitals should look at outpatient mode not as an option but necessity to sustain and grow.

But expanding outpatient windows has its own challenges – finding competent physicians or doctors, cost associated with their overheads, deciding on disciplines to be more aggressively followed under ‘outpatient’ category, and not but not the least the likely billing challenges on account of expanding outpatient services.

Recruiting physicians for outpatient services will be a primary challenge. As every hospital begins to scout for talents from a limited pool, the aspirants may begin to command higher price. The initial cost of hiring may temporarily be result in negative revenues. Therefore, hospitals should be prepared for such scenario and be optimistic of eventual turn around in revenue margins.

Second, it may not be viable to pursue every discipline under ‘outpatient’ category – hospitals should explore their intrinsic competence and decide on disciplines that are demanded most in their location of operation.

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Last, the shift to outpatient services may give rise to unprecedented increase in billing activities. The sudden increase in billing may prove to be unbearable or burdensome to in-house or the billing services provider. Unless it is eased by a superior billing intervention, it may prove to be responsible for delay or denial of claims.

Notwithstanding hospitals’ capacity to alternate to outpatient mode with larger physician base, it is advisable to be mediated by people who are sensible in clinical and operational issues. Medicalbillersandcodes.com has time and again proved to be an able ally in times of clinical and operational crisis. Our resource base spread across 50 states in the U.S. offer instant remediation for billing, coding, RCM, AR Management, and a host of clinical and operational issues. At a time when hospitals’ stand on the verge of a major shift from inpatient to outpatient mode, MBC may well be your platform for prosperity.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Keeping your Clinical Focus Intact with Analysis-Backed AR Management Solutions

Every year physicians in the U.S. lose thousands of dollars in the form bad debts. These so called bad debts are Account Receivables that have surpassed the admissible time limit or deemed impossible to be followed up. Once Account Receivables are allowed to languish for more than 120 days, it is difficult, if not impossible, to get them followed up and claimed. It really requires a dedicated AR management practices to monitor and keep ARs active. While care providers’ internal billing staff may be relied upon to a certain extent, they have often been found to be limited in their ability to analyze the reasons behind pending reimbursements, devise strategies to reduce AR days, and speed up realization of claims. But, because these tasks essentially decide the providers’ financial health and progress, they need to be arranged somehow or sourced from somewhere. Therefore, outsourced AR management services seem to be the only way out.

While outsourced AR management services could have right answers to solving AR puzzle, you certainly need to judge your prospective AR management service providers’ credentials on certain parameters:

Ability to analyze long-pending ARs: AR analysis is believed to extract reasons for delay, denial, or long-pending ARs. The reasons so extracted are supposed to be vital leads in resubmitting, following up, modifying, or adjudicating long-pending ARs. Amongst several possible reasons, your AR management partner should be able to cull out reasons such as:

• Claim denial occurring due to patient’s non-eligibility of the insurance
  
• delays due to adjudication issues
  
• pending for request of clarification or documents
  
• denials due to errors in coding and charge entry
  
• delay in payment due to insufficient funds with government aided insurance carriers
  
• filing of the claims beyond the claims filing limit

Ability to devise systematic corrective measures: Reasoning alone will not suffice; your ARs will be converted into real revenues only when they are backed up with instant, effective, and corrective measures. While most of the AR management providers are generally believed to knowledgeable, it is always safe to be informed of their ability to:

• Process and systematically follow up with the insurance carrier for paper as well as electronic claims to improve reimbursements.
  
• be conversant with knowledge about the insurance companies’ policies and procedures that help process claims
  
• Keep records of past AR events that may come useful in dealing with similar future events.
  
• maintain good rapport with the insurance company will help the physicians’ office or the physician billing company in solving the issues more effectively
  
• handle major rejections and in prioritizing claims
  
• verify explanation of benefits, and preserve final payment documents for future use

While ascertaining your prospective AR management service provider is inevitable, you being care providers may not want to be distracted from your primary focus: clinical excellence. Medicalbillersandcoders.com has precisely been an operational partner for medical billing and allied services. With a resource-network across the 50 states in the U.S., we promise to keep your clinical focus intact with some of the best analysis-backed AR management solutions. While our AR management solutions have been inclusive in our total RCM solutions, you can also get them customized exclusively to your practice needs. 

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.

Negotiating Justifiable Contract with Health Insurance Companies

Care providers operate in an environment characterized by multiple payors – Medicare, Medicaid, and a host of private health plans. The prevalence of such multi-payer is reason enough for differences in rates at which care providers are reimbursed despite the clinical procedures more or less being the same. Adding to this heterogeneous payor-environment is the regional differences wherein a physician practicing in an urban state gets reimbursed more than its counterpart in a rural state.  Are we simply to believe that these are irreversible factors, and physicians are left with no avenues but to accept what is offered?

Certainly, multi-payor system and regional factors should never hold you from claiming what you really deserve. If you happen to be as good a care provider as your counterpart in a metropolis, you are entitled to be reimbursed on par with the best rates. This is where your negotiation skills come into the fore – convincing you’re your payors as to why they should reimburse you at the rates given in the fee schedule, equivalent to the CPT codes, and to the maximum extent possible.

The extent to which you can negotiate is often decided by your being in a particular network – HMO or PPO. If you are a HMO provider, your negotiation is limited to Medicare or Medicaid fee schedule.  Medicare, being public plan, reimburses you at a rate which is comparatively less than a physician gets by being a provider in PPO. At best you can insist on getting reimbursed on par with what the admissible CPTs deserve.  But, to insist on being paid at CPT-equated level, you will certainly need to back up with clinical and quality credentials – care excellence, EHR implementation, and compliant coding and billing practices.

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If you happen to PPO provider, being supported mostly by private carriers, can expect variable and maximum scope for negotiation – by being in the PPO network, you can expect to be paid at rates higher than in Medicare fee schedule.  But your payors are not going to be convinced unless you support you claim with valid reasons and proof. Amongst many ways through which you can negotiate better deals with your payors are:

• Keeping track of history of your claim submission and eventual realization:
This will provide with variance in your expectation and eventual pay out. When such variance are brought to the notice of your contracted payors, payors may be inclined to have a relook at the existing reimbursements, and may even amend with higher rates.

• Being aware of the rates offered by other plans:
This will help you compare your reimbursements with what your counterparts in the similar field are paid by other plans elsewhere. When these differential rates are brought to your payors notice, they may be inclined to revise to higher rates provided your quality of health care is as good as it is elsewhere.

• Being aware of geographic advantage:
If you happen to practice in an area that distinctively know for medical care quality, you try to force this into your advantage; payors are generally convinced of relatively higher level of quality care in urban and metropolis.

• By threatening to walk out temporarily:
If your payor is not open to the idea of negotiating, you may consider coming out of the contract. And when you start billing 100% to your patients, patients in turn may switch sides to payors that offer maximum coverage. This may force your original payor reconsider his original stance.

All these seemingly possible tactics would have to be carefully implemented. Care providers, who are primarily focused on clinical job, may be found wanting tactically. This is where medical billers would be sorely required. Medicalbillersandcoders.com – with a thorough understanding of multi-payer reimbursement environment – continues to mediate justifiable contract with health insurance companies across the 50 states in the U.S. Irrespective of your being HMO or PPO, our expert team of insurance contract negotiation is essentially driven by the motto: “maximizing your reimbursements”.

Medical Billers and coders (MBC) is one of the leading Medical Billing Companies in USA & help doctors to shortlist Medical Billing Companies, Medical Billing Services according to their preferences of specialty, city, software and services performed.