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Get Your Medical Practice On Track for Medical Billing Success

December 14, 2020
Staying up-to-date on the latest medical billing best practices can be overwhelming for in-house billing staff as they are trying to stay on top of day-to-day responsibilities and even manage old or denied claims. 

Technology and regulations improve and change constantly, and these updates should be watched to ensure your practice is providing the best possible billing experience for patients and is generating revenue.

Coronis Health brings together the best in healthcare revenue cycle management and medical billing to create a team with more than 100 years of experience helping niche healthcare practices and facilities get every last dollar of what they are owed. We ensure practices and facilities create a smooth process for patients, manage their revenue cycles effectively, and follow claims and appeals best practices.

4 Easy Ways to Improve Medical Billing for your Patients

Do you want to improve your practice’s medical billing and claims process? It can be a challenge to manage everything from billing procedures and patient accounts to the revenue cycle. It is time-consuming. It burdens your front-end employees, hurting the efficiency of your practice.

If you want your patients to be happy, you want to keep functions, such as medical billing, simple for your patients. Here are 4 easy ways to do so.

1. Verify Patient Insurance

It is important to verify each patient’s insurance before an appointment. This should be done a few days before the appointment so that it can be rescheduled if their insurance has not been verified. You may want to assign an employee exclusively to this task.

2. Use Medical Billing Technologies

You can enhance your collections process using the latest tools, such as the automated revenue management tool, in which automated reminder messages can be set up for payments. Now there are tools available that let you track all information on your mobile devices too.

3. Collect Right Away

It is ideal that collections are made when patients are in your office, whether it is past due balances, co-pays, deductibles, or co-insurances. Create a system so that patients clear all dues before they leave your office.

4. Claim Accuracy

Train your staff to verify the accuracy of all patient information so that your claims are free of mistakes and you can reduce denials and increase revenue.

Manage your Revenue Cycle Effectively

In a medical practice, it is essential to stay on top of revenue management to ensure a healthy bottom line and to keep the practice going. Revenue cycle management has come a long way, thanks to medical billing technology and modern hospital or medical practice management. Here are 2 simple steps to manage your revenue cycle more effectively.

1. Patients should be able to pay easily

Patients always look for convenience. If you wish to improve the patient experience, make it easier for patients to pay. The best way to ensure smoother payments is to inform them upfront about the billing procedures and how much they are expected to pay. You can keep credit card records to speed up the payment process.

2. Track Performance

It is essential to track your staff’s performance to ensure that all billing and revenue related functions are being carried out accurately and on time. An easy way to track this is to check the claim denial rate, the cost to collect, and patient service revenue. Such figures will help you determine if your revenue management is happening the way it should.

Claims and Appeals Best Practices

As a medical practice, you must be well-aware that insurance companies do not always pay every claim for the agreed-upon rate, for various reasons. In the case of denials or underpayments, it is best to identify whether the claims need appealing. Since appealing is a lengthy process, the following should first be considered.

Correct Billing

Claims denials are the result of data entry errors. Before appealing a claim, check whether the claim was billed accurately and correctly the first time.

Common data entry denials might be due to :

  • Incomplete or inaccurate patient information
  • Bundling denials due to incorrect modifier usage
  • Missing information
  • Inappropriate modifiers used
  • A mismatch between the CPT and diagnosis used

CPT Guidelines

CPT guidelines compliance may not always be easy to achieve. Insurance companies are not required to follow nationally recognized guidelines now. So, accurate claims are even more important now. If you are sure that the claim was billed correctly initially, check the insurance payor’s provider billing or administrative guide.

Payer-Provider Contract

Check whether contracted services are being billed appropriately. If contractual procedures are not being followed, then it may not be possible to appeal a denied claim.

Let Coronis Health Help Get Your Medical Practice On Track

These guidelines might seem overwhelming to an in-house staff that is already busy with day-to-day operations. Coronis Health is dedicated to maintaining these standards for all our clients, and we can help your medical practice or facility, as well. Contact us today to get started or schedule your free financial check-up, in which Coronis Health finds missing revenue in 95% of our reviews.

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