Best Practices for Patient Payment Plans

A statistic from “2011 Trends in Healthcare Payments Report” reveals that 65% of patients felt that every healthcare organization should offer Patient Payment Plans! While most organizations are adhering to this demand of their patients, in hopes of boosting their revenues, they are also coming across many challenges in this regard. While payment plans are a great way to raise revenues for the healthcare organizations, but the collection of such payments is not always simple. Many healthcare organizations across the US are still struggling with this new payment type. So, here are some best practices that you can use to simplify the payment process for Patient Payment Plans.

Automate the Payments: Managing a calendar for each patient, making calls when the payment date approaches and then reminding him/her to make the manual payment is such a waste of effort. The best policy in this respect would be to automate the payment process, whereby installment amount gets deducted automatically from the patient’s account. Pre-authorized payments can cut short the unnecessary follow-up needs.

Automate the Communications: There are many instances when automatic deductions can lead to confusions. The patient who has already pre-authorized his payment forgets this fact completely. He gets a shock when checking the bank statement and calls you up with an intention to quarrel. You can save such unpleasant instances by sending automated emails before the payment is deducted.

Create a Rule: It is good to offer payment flexibility to the patient. But the Patient Payment Portal should also have a set of rules too. You need to set the parameter for minimum monthly payments as well maximum time limit for complete payment (against the billed amount).

If you need any more help, use the third party services in regards to the Patient Payment Plans. It would help you manage the payments easily.

Patient Portal for Hospitals and Healthcare Clinics

Health care industry is now making use of smart technology to improve patient communication with doctors. Patient portals are widely adopted for and improving the way that physicians care for patients. It helps in managing with patient queries and grievances and informing them about health care, Patient Payment Plans, health records and other related aspects. Patient portals are nowadays popularly used by hospitals, clinics and other medical practices. They usually serve a variety of functions for a health care unit. These portals are kind of online platforms enable patients to communicate with hospitals in a real time without any hassle. They are able to get access to personal medical information, request medication refills, receive lab results, email physicians, make payments and schedule appointments with physicians. They also allow individuals or patients to complete array of task on themselves by using online platforms without any need to visit hospitals.

Patient portals reduces the number of time patients forget to attend appointment with doctor. Patient Payment Portal makes it easy for patients to pay bill from anywhere. They also help in reviewing and managing bill. These portals usually send automatic emails and messages on phones as reminders about upcoming appointments. It also helps hospital staff to easily maintain the record of schedule appointments. There is no need to call receptionist to book appointment with a specific doctor and individuals can book appointment and review schedules on their own with the click of a mouse.

These portals are able to enhance patient engagement with hospital. If they are able to get all information quickly, there are more chances that they will utilize the services in future as well. Patients are able to get access to medical information within shortest span of time such as such as test results and just generally stay more informed.

Patient Payment Portal helps in completing daily administrative task and managing bill payments of a hospital or clinic in more efficient way. It allows patients to make appointments on their own on the portal as well as find the Patient Payment Plans offered by the hospital. It provides extra time to administrative task to handle other matters.

With help of patient portals, patient physician relationships are enhanced, patients able to communicate their concerns with doctor through email or instant message doctors. They don’t need to visit doctor for small concerns. In this way, patients are likely to feel more satisfied with their physician and overall patient care.

Benefits of Outsourcing Insurance Credentialing Services

Most of the healthcare units and healthcare practitioners nowadays look for third party service providers to outsource a variety of tasks such as Certified Medical Coding Service, Insurance Credentialing Services, medical billing services etc. These service providers have efficient team to handle all the procedures as per the rules and regulations.

Physician credentialing the process of verifying the professional records of the doctors. When a doctor applies to practice within a hospital or any other healthcare organisation, they are required to application and allow a credentialing entity to research their professional documents. Similarly, healthcare units also required to obtain Insurance Credentialing Services and a participating provider contract with insurance companies that are significant to their service area. A successful revenue cycle is important for survival of a healthcare unit in the long run.

Credentialing is a process in which insurance companies will verify education and professional experience of a doctor to make sure they meet the standard criteria to for serving as an in-network provider on their panel. Every insurance company is required to provide web based directories for listing all in-network providers for their plans. So consumers can easily use them to locate physicians and other healthcare providers who accept their insurance.

In order to find insurance companies to credential with them, it is recommended to ask peer in practice in your area or an office manager who handles billing in your area and get an idea of the insurance companies’engaged in offering the most patient base in your area. 

It is important to get familiar with local insurance companies in your area. It is recommended to look for reputed service providers specializing in Insurance Credentialing Services as they make the whole task easy and hassle free for medical practitioners.

The process of getting a provider credentialed with a payer is lengthy task that involves completing the application forms, providing clarifications to questions from payers and following up with them to close the credentialing request. A credentialing process usually involve following steps:

·         Evaluation of application, submitting the required documents and identifying exceptions.

·         Verifying the practitioner/ facility information from physicians

·         Obtaining missing documents and updating payer's database, following with payers, maintenance of provider’s data and update information as per policies and procedures, and CAHQ profile.

A credentialing service provider is completely familiar with the formalities involved in the process and the forms required by each payer, and their policies and procedures. It is always recommended to look for reputed and renowned service providers to meet all your credentialing needs in a hassle freeway. If you are looking for credentialing provider or medical billing service provider, you can easily over internet by searching or credentialing and Medical Billing Service Near Me. It is prudent to look only for reputed companies having vast experience in the industry.

To know more about Certified Medical Coding Service, Insurance Credentialing Services and Medical Billing Service Near Me, please visit at www.elitemedbiz.com.

Outsourcing Medical Billing Services to Offshore Companies

Medical billing is an essential aspect of the management of any healthcare unit. If the medical billing process is not managed efficiently, it will bring losses to a healthcare unit. When it comes to managing medical billing, insurance and other financial process of any healthcare unit, there are usually two options. The first option is to hire an in-house team and second option is to outsource medical billing services to an offshore company exclusively dealing in providing billing solutions for healthcare units. Most of the healthcare practitioners as well as healthcare units are nowadays turning towards offshore medical coding and billing companies to meet their coding and billing needs. Offshore medical billing companies are proving to be great choice for handling medical coding and billing for individual practitioners as well as established medical care firms in manifold ways:

Medical billing companies follows the latest industry norms and rules and regulations to provide billing solutions. They usually deal with a vast number of clients in healthcare industry, so they are familiar with the rules and regulations and billing practices followed in the industry.

·        When you outsource medical billing to a reputed service provider, they have human and non-human resources to take care of the billing process for its clients. For instance, many of them uses professional software like Meditouch Medical Billing Software to provide accurate and fast billing solutions. Meditouch Practice Management helps medical billing providers to provide billing in quick turnaround time.

·        Outsourcing medical billing saves your time, efforts and money involved in handling medical billing at your own. A healthcare unit don’t need to spend on Meditouch Medical Billing Software or any staff to handle it. They also don’t need to bear other cost including recruitment of the staff, infrastructure etc. Offshore companies are equipped with resources and staff to make medical billing easy and fast for its clients. They are well trained with using software such as Meditouch Practice Management to provide accurate solutions.

·        When a healthcare provider outsources medical billing, their employees have more time to focus on the patient care and treatment and other everyday tasks, while billing is efficiently managed by offshore company specialising in it.

·        Medical billing industry experts can provide valuable inputs for insurance contract negotiations. They are familiar with the terminology used by insurance providers and can be relied for obtaining better rates for a healthcare units.

To know more about Meditouch Medical Billing Software and Meditouch Practice Management, please visit atwww.elitemedbiz.com.

Significance & Benefits of Patient Portals for Healthcare Units

Payment collection strategies of healthcare units are now changing. More and more health care units are making use of payment portals for collecting payments as well as for other requirements.

With the increase in highly deductible Patient Health Plans, it has become necessary for healthcare units to develop their systems for billing and collecting at the individual levels.

Patient portals like Patient Payment Portal is becoming increasingly popular among healthcare units and are utilized by them to improve the quality of the services offered to the patients and save cost, time and efforts engaged in accomplishing each task manually. These portals encourage better communication between patient and healthcare practitioners.

A Patient Payment Portal comes with varied features, so an organisation or individual can choose as per their specific requirements. From scheduling appointment and billing to chronic care and Patient Payment Plans, these software have a number of different and important applications. For instance, medical units can make use of cloud based portals.

Patient portals can be used for accomplishing varied tasks that otherwise need to make phone calls such as scheduling appointments, referrals, and prescription refills etc. All these things can be automatically processed with the help of the web portals. In this way, patient portals improve communication, elimination of paperwork, unrestricted electronic access, better relationships, improved outcomes, and an optimized workflow. 

Patient portals are also preferred by patients as it save their time, money and efforts. And hence, patient portals helps in retention and improve overall revenue. It has been found in studies that patient using portals are 13 percent more likely to stay with a provider. Hence, apart from improving the quality of services and better clinical results, patient portals serve as an important tool in increasing revenues. It is usually daunting and expensive task to track down patients for unpaid bills. However, people feel comfortable in making payments through Patient Payment Portal. It means the health care service providers more likely to get paid and in a faster manner. Patient portals make it easy to access and share information electronically. These portals are great tools to enhance communication and improve revenues of any healthcare unit.

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Outsourcing Medical Coding Services for Improving Efficiency of a Healthcare Unit

Every healthcare organisation is dependent on accurate records to maintain its operations smoothly and successfully. In the last few decades, there has been tremendous changes in almost all aspects of health care units varying from patient care to billing process and from infrastructures to medical coding and record management. Also, individual medical practitioners as well as healthcare units are also required to absolutely comply with regulations. Medical coding is one such important requirement of any healthcare unit. Without accurate medical coding, your healthcare unit won’t get payment or reimbursement from insurance companies or other third parties. If the coding is not executed properly, it can severely effect the revenue of healthcare unit. Though, there are alternatives to appeal when there are mistakes in coding, but the whole process is lengthy and time consuming. Thus, it is ideal to execute coding accurately at the first attempt. Many companies outsource Medical Coding Services and Medical Billing Services to third party service providers.

Many organisations handle medical coding and billing on their own. However, it requires to manage and maintain staff devoted largely to the task of coding. When administrative staff is also handling medical coding, there are higher chances of errors in it. Thus, most healthcare units are turning towards outsourcing service providers for Medical Coding Services to free up their employee time, so they can better focus on the core activities.

When administrative staff lack skills and specialization in coding, it will put company into troublesome situations. Outsourcing companies have specialized staff hired specifically to execute the coding for clients in highly proficient manner. They have skills and experienced to handle all the coding efficiently. They have a team of certified medical coders working under a manger making sure that each coder works accurately and complying with all regulations. They are also regularly trained to update their knowledge on current codes and regulations. When the coding work is undertaken by certified coders having up to date knowledge on all coding changes and will have experience working with all of the coding needs of any organisation. Outsourcing Medical Billing Services and Medical Coding Services allow medical units to delegate task to experienced professionals answerable to the organisation. They provide analytics and reports, so the healthcare unit can estimate the success rate of medical coding tasks.

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Why Outsource Insurance Credentialing Services to Third Parties?

When physicians or healthcare units need to bill an insurance company for receiving reimbursement, they need to undergo process of credentialing in which the insurance company verifies the education, training, experience, and competency of the physician or medical service provider. It usually takes 90 to 120 days to complete the process of insurance credentialing.

Medical Credentialing of a healthcare physician is one of the critical steps. A trivial mistake may cause a delay and it eventually result in wastage of time and loss of revenue. However, nowadays, there are many companies offering Certified Medical Coding Service and Insurance Credentialing Services to physicians and health care units, so as to make the process fast and hassle free.

Nowadays, many physician and healthcare service providers prefer to outsource medical coding and Insurance Credentialing Services to third parties. When you Outsource Insurance Credentialing services, they help to navigate the process of provider enrolment and medical credentialing. Their service usually include the following aspects:

•          Preparing the necessary documents and certificates and filling the necessary application forms
•         Verifying all the records and certificates
•          Submitting all the forms and documents and assuring faster approvals.
•          Taking all necessary steps to complete enrolment formalities and medical billing credentialing
•         Maintaining all the necessary records for the entire process
•         Keeping track of all registrations
•         Processing re-credentialing wherever required

Benefits of outsourcing insurance credentialing services

Outsourcing certified medical coding service and credentialing service is beneficial for healthcare professionals as well a healthcare units in numerous ways:

• It makes the whole process easy, fast and hassle free for physicians and healthcare units
• It tends to improve the credibility of a physicians among the insurance companies, so they can get prompt payments.
• It tends to increase revenues and reduce the delays in payments as well as account receive bale days.
• It leads to improve the goodwill of a health care professional and the processis completed in a timely manner.
• Physician can divert more time and attention on improving the quality of services offered to patients.