Here is a collection of original articles, news stories and blogs that have been put together by our team.
5 Easy Strategies to Improve Collections at Medical Practices
5 Easy Strategies to Improve Collections at Medical Practices For many medical billing professionals, accounts receivable (AR) objectives are the biggest challenge in revenue cycle management. Yet, benchmarking AR is not difficult if approached with the proper...
4 Strategies for Medical Practices to Survive Reimbursement Changes
4 Strategies for Medical Practices to Survive Reimbursement Changes The changes in reimbursement policies and payment models have made it challenging for independent practitioners to maintain financial stability, let alone see a growth in revenue. In addition, stiff...
10 Questions About MACRA Answered
10 Questions About MACRA Answered What is MACRA? MACRA is an acronym for the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act. CHIP stands for the Children’s Health Insurance Program. MACRA is a landmark legislation that outlines a value-based approach for the...
Life Cycle of a Medical Claim
Life Cycle of a Medical Claim Most people believe that a medical claim begins and ends with reimbursement. While reimbursement is undoubtedly a vital component, it is not the only piece in the lifecycle of a medical claim. Understanding and distinguishing the...
Feeling Overwhelmed By MIPS? These 4 Strategies Will Help.
Feeling Overwhelmed By MIPS? These 4 Strategies Will Help. Most physicians have a general understanding of MIPS, but many are feeling overwhelmed by the intricacies of the new payment model. Yet physicians who are unsure of their approach to MIPS are at financial...
Does Your Medical Practice Website Have These 7 Essential Features?
Does Your Medical Practice Website Have These 7 Essential Features? You probably know that a website is essential for your medical practice. But do you know that the average visitor spends about 10 seconds deciding whether to stay on your site or leave? It goes...
Outsourced or In-House Billing – What is Right for Your Medical Practice?
Outsourced or In-House Billing – What is Right for Your Medical Practice? For physicians in independent practice, one of the biggest decisions to make is whether to outsource their medical billing to a third-party service provider or assign the task to in-house staff....
Medical Cost Trends in 2018
PwC’s Health Research Institute has published its annual projection of medical costs in the employer health insurance marketplace. The report identifies the key factors that will impact growth trends in medical costs in 2018. It is expected that the coming year will...
The Essential Guide to Understanding MIPS
The Essential Guide to Understanding MIPS January 1, 2017, was a landmark date for healthcare reimbursement in the United States. It marked the start of the first performance period under the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System or MIPS. The new payment model will...
Surviving Reimbursement Changes and Growing Your Independent Medical Practice
Surviving Reimbursement Changes and Growing Your Independent Medical Practice In recent times, there have been a number of changes in the reimbursement models and payment methods for independent medical practices. This has meant physicians in private practice are...
The Pros and Cons of Outsourcing Medical Billing
The Pros and Cons of Outsourcing Medical Billing It's a tough call for physicians to decide how they want to handle medical billing at their practice. On the one hand, outsourcing the entire process to the experts seems appealing as the most convenient way to handle...
8 Ways to Improve Medical Practice Efficiency
8 Ways to Improve Medical Practice Efficiency Physicians in private practice sometimes face a plateau in revenue, or worse, declining collections. However, cost cutting and control of overheads is not the only way to maintain or increase income. Here are 8 ways to...
Follow These Steps and Watch Your Medical Practice Grow
Follow These Steps and Watch Your Medical Practice Grow Improving medical billing is one way to help your medical practice grow. Efficient revenue cycle management is perhaps the single most important factor for a healthy bottom line. The question most physicians must...
Is Your Practice Violating These HIPAA Regulations?
Is Your Practice Violating These HIPAA Regulations? Fines for HIPAA violations can be up to $50,000 per incident. The maximum annual penalty for a violation is $1.5 million. Some of the largest HIPAA settlement fines have been paid by Advocate Health System in Downers...
Practical Ways to Boost Your Medical Practice Revenue
Practical Ways to Boost Your Medical Practice Revenue A profitable practice keeps patients, providers, and practice managers happy. But building a profitable practice can seem like a herculean task. It doesn't have to be, though. There are many practical and...
Common Culprits in Medical Claims Rejections
Common Culprits in Medical Claims Rejections Even the most experienced medical billers make mistakes once in a while. Sometimes insurance companies try to pull a fast one. In either case, every medical practice gets some claims rejected. Here are some of the most...
7 things to know about US healthcare spending, pricing in 2017
U.S. healthcare spending reached a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $3.49 trillion in April, 4.4 percent higher than the same month the year prior, according to an Ann Arbor, Mich.-based Altarum’s Center for Sustainable Health Spending report.
7 Insights on progress toward value-based care
A survey of 302 primary care physicians with hospital affiliations and 150 health plan executives examines progress that must still be realized to achieve value-based care. These include achieving better alignment between providers and payers and improvements in electronic health records to bridge critical gaps. Some widely differing views exist between providers and insurers on common issues.
Audit estimates CMS issued hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of incorrect EHR incentive payments
As part of a program to encourage providers to shift to EHRs, the federal government incorrectly paid hundreds of millions of dollars in incentive payments to healthcare professionals who did not actually meet Meaningful Use requirements. The HHS Office of Inspector General estimates that inappropriate payments to eligible professionals totaled $729 million between May 2011 and June 2014.
Health Care Providers on the Problems of Patient Engagement Design
Better patient engagement is a nearly universal goal for health care providers, but real barriers exist, say health care leaders and clinicians. Nearly two-thirds (63%) of respondents to NEJM Catalyst’s latest Insights Council survey on patient engagement call the time investment required by health teams the biggest challenge in designing patient engagement into care delivery.The underlying issue is reimbursements, says Bertrand Ross, MD, FACC, FACP, Medical Director at Virginia-based Optima Health, a subsidiary of Sentara Healthcare providing health plan coverage to more than 450,000 members. “The problem is that incentives [for patient engagement] are not aligned. The time and effort to educate, motivate, and troubleshoot issues regarding patient engagement are not recompensed very well at present.” Create alignment, he says, and the time investment challenge will disappear.”
