Regardless of specialization, all practices must create methods to manage their billing accurately and effectively. The most efficient, secure way to handle billing and claims is by working with a medical billing service company.
If you’re considering partnering with a firm to handle your billing, this article explores the many benefits of working with a medical billing service. Read on to learn why working with a medical billing firm is essential for your practice and patients.
Why This is Important
The top priorities of any medical practice are quality patient care and securing positive patient outcomes. Many factors contribute to reaching these goals, including how a practice executes its billing management.
Hiring an in-house billing specialist is costly: finding and acquiring quality talent takes time. Providing a salary and benefits package, training, and designated office space requires significant financial investment from your practice. But working with a medical billing service reduces these costs, providing your practice access to quality talent without the price tag of hiring a full-time employee.
In addition to the financial and quality benefits of outsourcing your billing, investing in professional billing and claims expertise allows your team to focus on what matters most: the patient. When providers and staff are freed from the burden of billing and claim paperwork, they can focus all their energy on the patient experience and providing positive outcomes.
Instead of becoming bogged down in the red tape that comes with billing, coding, and compliance, providers can spend more time optimizing practice workflow, ensuring they’re implementing efficient processes in their offices.
Office workflows directly affect the patient experience. When a practice can optimize and streamline task management, more focus is dedicated to the patient, producing better patient experiences and outcomes and increased growth.
Five Benefits of Working with a Medical Billing Service
Working with a medical billing service benefits practices of all sizes and specialties. We list the top five benefits below.
Access to Billing and Coding Experts in All Specialties
Partnering with a medical billing firm grants providers access to industry experts in billing and coding in various specialties. This high-level expertise provides much-needed support, especially for areas in which your teams might be unfamiliar. A best-in-class medical billing company will have certified medical coders and billers with years of experience who can put their heads together to help your practice resolve issues with payers and claims. This is much more powerful than keeping your billing in-house. The medical billing company will also provide their employees with ongoing training and continuing education; in-house billers may not have consistent training made available to them.
Peace of mind comes when you hire a strong billing company because there is always coverage on your account. If you have one in-house biller, and that person has a crisis or needs to leave your practice for some reason, your cash flow is drastically impacted. A good medical billing company always has enough employees available to complete the work, even when a team member is on leave.
Simple Integration of Practice Management Software
Partnering with a medical billing service eliminates the often-overlooked hassle and stress of choosing practice management software. When your practice works with a billing firm, you seamlessly integrate into their established systems. You’re not tasked with selecting and purchasing software, designing workflows, or training your staff.
Billings services have their own IT provider, and your staff can easily access your data. Your practice doesn’t have to spend time or money setting up IT. Everything is set in place and ready for your team.
When choosing your medical billing service provider, you want to ensure the software is intuitive. Onboarding should be simple, and the system should be easy to understand and navigate.
Full Transparency Claim Information and Reports
Many billing services have programs that provide data analytics to help you understand reports and drive better results. Through the billing service’s IT, providers and staff will have complete transparency to claim information and detailed reports to help them manage their practice. (Do not hire a medical billing company that refuses to allow you to access your data.)
Providers and staff can access vital reporting and analytics when managing practice operations. Access to this data empowers teams to make practice management decisions that lead to:
- Improved collections and charge capture
- Fewer days in accounts receivable
- Improved and even increased cashflow
The right medical billing provider delivers more than exceptional coding, billing, and claims services. It provides the tools and analytics you need to streamline your workflows, increase efficiency, and grow your practice.
Credentialing and Contracting
When you partner with a firm for billing and claims management, you have access to experts who can handle your credentialing. Before providing patient care, new practices and providers must be credentialed with insurance plans. This is a tedious process, often consuming weeks’ worth of time spent on paperwork. The longer your credentialing takes, the longer your practice must wait to see patients –– and cash flow.
By working with a medical billing service, you are in direct contact with credentialing experts. They handle your applications promptly, which can then be processed quickly by payers, thereby improving your cash flow. The best medical billing companies use specialized credentialing software to house all the credentialing data; this software is used to communicate with the payers electronically, eliminating lost data and preventing payer errors.
Contracting experts are also available to negotiate your contracts with payers, helping to optimize reimbursement for the care you provide. These same experts can review your existing contracts, renegotiate your contracts, and update your fee schedules as needed.
Decreased Expenses and a Better Bottom Line
Your practice’s resources are precious: time, energy, and, of course, money. Resource preservation is essential, but not when that means cutting corners.
Hiring staff to manage your billing, coding, and claims are challenging and costly. When you bring on an in-house billing specialist, you’re immediately presented with fixed costs: payroll, benefits, equipment, and training costs. And that’s assuming you can find the right candidate for the position. Many practices seeking in-house billing specialists spend months finding talent to fill the role. This leads to overworked teams spread thin trying to manage your billing. Ultimately, the risk of error and burnout rises to dangerous levels. This also leads to lost revenues when your billing isn’t handled appropriately.
Working with a billing company provides direct access to proven talent without the costs of employing a new team member in-house. Investing in a medical billing service helps your bottom line by addressing resource spending at various levels and returning time and money to your practice.
Conclusion
Medical practices must prioritize quality billing and claims management. A single error can cause significant issues for the practice and the patient. Talented and professional billing personnel are essential to the success of your medical practice, regardless of your field or specialty.
Larsen Billing brings decades of experience to deliver exceptional medical billing services for your practice. Reach out to our team today to learn how our industry experts can help your practice thrive with our multifaceted billing solutions.