Yes, truly! You can be assured of your practice’s financial health by asking yourself these Three Questions periodically:
1. Is my front office efficient? Because front office is where it all begins. When we consider the fact that most patients have a minimum of $10-$15 primary physician copay and $30-$40 specialist copay,
You should never, ever drop the ball on this. This is a question you should ask yourself every few weeks because it is very easy to lose out on claim and appeal timely filing limits. When your denials are not worked timely, it is not only the payer side of revenue you are losing, it is the patient side revenue too because as claims become older, your patients will not appreciate being billed for services that were rendered over six months ago that they have forgotten about. Even when the care provider is very good, patients can still leave practices just because they do not receive their statements in a timely manner
2. Are my payers reimbursing me at the contracted rate? Yes, you entered the contract when you started practicing and your commercial payers have been reimbursing you quite well for the past so many years, but do you ever pause to think, am I getting paid as per my contractual agreement? More often than not, smaller payers are bought by larger companies and those larger companies consolidate and new clauses and payment modalities are put into your contract without you ever realizing about them. It is important to review your contracts yearly and do an analysis of your top procedures to ensure your payers are reimbursing you at the agreed upon rate. A good revenue cycle management company can help you do this.
3. Is my payer and patient AR being worked timely? You should never, ever drop the ball on this. This is question you should ask yourself every few weeks because it is very easy to lose out on claim and appeal timely filing limits. When your denials are not worked timely, it is not only the payer side of revenue you are losing, it is the patient side revenue too because as claims become older, your patients will not appreciate being billed for services that were rendered over six months ago that they have not forgotten about. Even when the care provider is very good, patients can still leave practices because they do not receive their statements in a timely manner.
So long as you periodically keep asking yourself and your billing personnel these questions, you will never lose control of your practice’s financial health.
For expert advice and FREE consultation, call us now (800) 811-2103 x11!
