The US healthcare system has drastically changed and how!
No longer is only the provider bearing the burden of financial responsibility, with the liability now shifted more towards the patients. Furthermore, the high deductible policies and the yearly escalation of the number of co-pays and insurance, the out of pocket expense for the patient’s have significantly increased, making it extremely difficult for the healthcare provider to get timely collections.
IMPORTANCE OF PATIENT COLLECTION
Did you know that the minute the patient leaves the practice, the chance of getting payment gets reduced by 20%? Imagine the same for when a patient is discharged after being hospitalized for several days?
While the profession does have the noble adjective attached to it, this should not let you overlook the fact that it is the money that is allowing you to serve the patient.
If in good faith, you plan to waive off co-pays or deductibles of certain reluctant patients, you might end up paying a hefty price for it. How, you ask?
Because:
- You would be violating HIPAA policies and might be subjected to a penalty on the ground of providing wrong financial information by your commercial carrier.
- You would also be violating carrier policies like that of Medicare and Medicaid, who will similarly consider it a misinterpretation of charges and you might have to pay a fine under committing a fraud.
- You cannot possibly afford to waive off amount, big or small, as it will not only affect your facility’s financial health but also decrease its value in the healthcare industry. You wouldn’t want that now, would you?
TIPS TO IMPROVE PATIENT COLLECTION
Are you wondering how the healthcare facility are affected if the financial burden, co-pays, and deductible have increased the responsibility on the patient?
It is because not every hospital has a robust strategy in place, which is why today we are going to share specific tips that will help hospitals improve their patient collection system:
- Make sure your patients are well informed of your collection policy while they are scheduling an appointment with your practice. This will increase your chances of getting paid upfront since the aware patient will not prepare themselves for the payment. Furthermore, ensure that all the patient fees, which include the co-pays, deductibles, coinsurance, and payment for services and supplies that are not covered by the carrier are made at the time of the service.
- Have a payment plan in place, especially for the patient’s that have high out of the et expense. This will instill satisfaction in your patient for your hospital, thereby engaging them to be loyal towards the facility’s policies. Moreover, if your patients have are not paying the entire amount, make sure they pay half of the amount. This will remind them of their financial responsibility towards the practice.
- Take advantage of the fact that our vision is our dominant sense and post pictures, charts explaining your collection procedure, so as to encourage your patient to make upfront payments.
- While the insured patient receives a discount on payment by their insurance company, the burden of payment on the self-paying patient is comparatively high, which means the risk of not getting paid is also higher. To mitigate that your facility can structure the policy of offering discounts to the self-paying patients who are making payments on time.
- The word is going cashless, why not your facility? Promote timely payment by creating a patient portal wherein all details of the patient will be filled, and they will be reminded of the due payments. Patient portals will help you save extensively in the paper bills that you send on the addresses to get lost and forgotten forever, and the chances of getting quicker payment are enhanced with online payment.
- Make sure that you frequently contact the payers that are resilient on not paying on time. Contact them once a week during business hours to make it clear to them that the payment has to be made in said time.
- Using the right technology can help optimize the patient collection, thereby cutting down on the collection cost just like it did for SCL Health, wherein they devised the policy to identify high-risk patients, created an effective strategy for patient collection and formulated recover strategy to minimize the loss due to the delayed patient collection.
- Hold review sessions to keep a track on which of your payment collection strategies are working and how effectively. This will help you come up with better payment collection policies and check how many patients have crossed their due date for payment.
As the healthcare landscape will evolve further, it will become more difficult for the healthcare service provider to ensure timely collections. This will freeze your entire revenue cycle, which will hinder your ability to provide quality treatment and care to the patient. Also, burdening your in-house team would be distracting them from their ultimate goal of serving people, which is why you should outsource either a part of your billing cycle or the entire revenue cycle management to a proficient agency like Medphine.
Medphine dedicated team of revenue cycle and accounts receivable managers will make sure that the patient promptly pays for the service they have been provided. This is especially crucial in cases where an insurance policy covers them, claims can be immediately filed for quicker reimbursement, and there is no operational or financial disruption in the healthcare organization.
Patient collection, as mentioned above is one of the primary reasons for denied or rejected claims, but Medphine’s AR and RCM specialists will ensure that there is no delay in the follow-ups and payments are made quick and easy.
From monitoring every aspect of the revenue cycle to smoothing out the current receivables, Mepdhine guarantees faster patient collection by forging and fostering a strong and amicable relationship with them and identifying the pattern of the payment, establishing who are the high-risk patients and accordingly develop a strategy to target them and get the payment done.
We have trust in Medphine’s capability to enhance your practice’s revenue with our meticulous struggles, but we want you to trust us first and then decide, whether or not you would like to go ahead.
What’s that, you ask?
We are offering a 30-day trial service with no long term contract obligation to help you decide on our capabilities. Medphine will not disappoint you, and we can guarantee you gradual increase in your revenue generation.
