5 Tips to Improve Medical Billing
Guest post by Erin Palmer, US News University Directory
In this challenging economy, families still need medical care but may not have the means to pay for it when the bill comes due. This can prove challenging for medical billing agencies. In such a climate, medical billing services need to increase their effectiveness and efficiency in order to get the best results for their physician and medical facility clients. Consider these tips to improve medical billing practices:
1. Use technology as an advantage.
Medical billing services that strive for effectiveness and efficiency may find technology advantageous. By utilizing up-to-date software for medical billing, organizations have the opportunity to quickly determine whether claims are likely to be accepted or denied based on the ever-evolving changes in billing rules for insurance plans, Medicare and Medicaid. The highest quality software automatically updates as rules change, helping medical billing professionals determine new trends in denials and work toward increasing the amount they can collect for clients.
2. Develop and utilize a formal service contract.
Running a medical billing business is just that: a business. It is critical to have all parties involved – the medical facility or physician and the medical billing agency – sign a contract that delineates exactly which parties are responsible for each task, how payment will be made and terms for ending the contract. Having a billing contract emphasizes professionalism and helps protect the physicians and medical billing company.
3. Use business intelligence to identify areas for improvement.
Accurate data mining is one of the best ways for medical billing agencies to improve their level of service and collection. With the innovations in medical billing software, unique reports can be run that provide specific information to assist in decision making and implementing improvements. Most of today’s billing software does offer the option to create custom reports. Once reports have been completed, they can assist medical billing management with increasing staff productivity, adjusting staffing requirements, as well as quickly identifying payment errors.
4. Communicate wisely with patients.
Medical billing professionals can assist medical staff by encouraging the posting of all billing information in an obvious location in the patient check in area. By having the terms of payment easily visible for patients, there is no confusion about billing practices of the medical service. This information should include insurance requirements, upfront payments, co-payments and billing procedures.
5. Collect full information.
One of the best ways to help a medical billing agency increase efficiency is to make sure patient information is accurate and complete. Having a patient’s address, full name, birth date, work information and multiple phone numbers is a critical part of the data collection process that will be used both with insurance companies and as part of the collection process, should requests for payment be ignored. Additionally, asking patients for their Social Security number is an excellent practice that can be extremely helpful when cases of non-payment are turned over to a collection agency.
Clearly, there are many ways for a medical billing practice to become more efficient and effective. Acquiring accurate patient information, using a comprehensive contract with physicians and medical services as well as utilizing cutting-edge software are all steps to optimize the organization. Incorporate these steps today to see a medical billing agency grow more profitable.
_______________________________________
This post was provided by Erin Palmer.
Erin writes about online healthcare training programs and allied health careers for US News University Directory. For more information please visit https://www.usnewsuniversitydirectory.com
Thank you so much for sharing this article, its just what I’ve been looking for!
Medical billing, coding & credentialing services by MedICD are not just another billing solution to outsource medical billing and transcribe patient data into billing codes. An expert team of medical billers and coders at MedICD ensures timely preparation of the claims and expedite the overall process to ensure that medical practices get maximum reimbursements in less time.
I appreciate you sharing this insightful and practical knowledge. Reading your blog helped me identify my mistakes. You have covered every aspect of medical billing, including suggestions for improvement. Again, many thanks. Please continue to post.
Thank you very much for the valuable content
It’s good to know that medical billing services that strive for effectiveness and efficiency may find technology advantageous.
Thank you
It’s great to know that medical billing services that strive for effectiveness and efficiency may find technology advantageous. My brother will start looking for medical billing services to make sure he can pay the bills of his wife’s pregnancy.. I’ll share this with him later since it can help with the collection. Thanks!
Thank you for sharing this very informative as well as useful information. After reading your blog I found where I am doing a mistake. You have covered everything about the medical billing and its process, with tips to improve it. Thanks once again. Please keep posting.
Communication is the key. We all go after all the features and ignore the most basic aspect that connects us as humans. Thanks for including this!
Improving your medical billing process does seem like a smart thing to do. I liked your suggestions about using technology to help you out. Also, it does seem like it would be smart to get a lawyers advice on how best to do the billing as well.
I liked that you mentioned that you should make sure that patient information is completely updated and accurate in order to increase efficiency when it comes to billing. My husband works in a clinic and he told me that he needs to find a commercial account billing service for the new system that they have installed. He should make sure that he hires a professional that can answer all the questions he might have about these type of services and how they can improve the efficiency of his business.
It’s good to know that medical billing companies should use technology to their advantage. My sister owns a dentist’s office, and she was telling me last night about how she is wanting to find more ways to make it easier to bill her patients. I’ll make sure to pass this information along to her so she can know more about medical billing services.
Good article. The technology’s advance could really be a huge help in this kind of business in my opinion.
It is good to know that you need to collect proper information. It does seem like an easy thing to overlook when it comes to medical billing. Also, it might be smart to get an expert to help you with medical billing.
Thank you for sharing some tips to improve medical billing. I never knew that transactions like these exist in hospitals for faster turnaround of revenues to the doctors and hospital staff. You made a good point in getting an up-to-date software for medical billing to best identify whether insurance claims are approved or otherwise and so it’s easy to tell how much a patient will be paying. The way I see it given the changing policies for insurance, it’s best to hand this responsibility over to the experts who will take care of sorting the amount of earnings that a medical staff and doctor should be earning per client. This was such an insightful article to read, thank you!
Nice information about the Medical Billing.I have learned many new things thanks for sharing.
Glad you enjoyed the post and were able to learn something!
I liked that you had mentioned that even with medical billing that it can be important to have a service contract that keeps both parties responsible. My wife might need to have an operation done in the coming weeks and we’ve been looking into having the operation done outside of the hospital. If we can find somewhere that offers medical billing, I’ll be making sure that we can set up a contract to make sure that me and the company are both responsible.
I like that you mentioned that using the most cutting edge technology can help to increase efficiency. I totally understand how software like that could help to speed the process along. I will definitely keep this in mind for the future, if I am ever in the industry.
Thank you for your post!This tutorial is fabulous! Lots of great info including,Medical billing is a central pillar of any health care practice.Although care is the top priority, your practice is still a medical billing services henderson in business. To make sure you’re actually getting paid for the services you provide, you’ll need a knowledgeable, focused and reliable team overseeing your billing.
As medical billing technologies evolve, it’s important to remember how accurate patient data is very important not only to the billing company, the healthcare provider, but also the patient! We should strive to give the best experience with healthcare services possible!
test
There are medical companies or agencies that help us in many ways. So thanks for sharing article on improving medical billing. Its really going to help doctors.
With the introduction and emergence of the medical software, most of the manual tasks listed above have been improved as most of the medical programs have automation functions. The medical software eliminates some possible human errors, great for data storage, faster data recovery, and seemingly speeds up a lot of medical billing processes.
Informative article for doctors. Dealing with medical bills is stressfull work…I am quite satisfy with my billing service providers.
This is a great article and I will recommend it to our clients to help their billing.
Thank you so much for sharing this article, its just what I’ve been looking for! I’ve never dealt with medical billing before. I’m really excited to see where it goes and what I can get from it, thank you so much for sharing! It a good feeling to know there’s help.