First Pst after migration to Cloud in Health care Blog

Meet Joe—a patient who is walking into a healthcare office, terrified of the news he might hear. He is confused and overwhelmed, not sure of where to turn for help. Joe isn’t entering a doctor’s exam room – he is actually walking into a hospital’s patient registration area, waiting to receive information about how much his procedure is going to cost. Although anxious about the procedure, Joe is even more concerned about its impact on the family budget, unsure of his insurance co-payment or what will be covered. He’s worried that he can’t afford to pay a large bill in one payment. His interactions with the registration staff over the next few minutes will set the stage for the remainder of his experience with the hospital. Now, let’s say the hospital realizes the value of having caring and compassionate financial conversations with patients at the start of the patient visit. Patient access staff quickly become the patient’s advocate while also improving the organization’s ability to collect from the patient and payer. In this instance, leveraging a data-driven approach allows staff to verify Joe’s identity and insurance coverage as well as provide an accurate estimate of his payment responsibility. The staff even can review data to assess his ability to pay and evaluate various payment plan and/or financial assistance options. Even after Joe is discharged, the hospital continues to employ a patient-centered approach to collections, using patient financial data to segment accounts that share demographic and financial profiles, rather than simply looking at balance amounts and number of days open. Joe’s financial data places his in the “most likely to pay” segment, indicating that he would not receive a payment follow up call until (for example) day 75 instead of the traditional call on day 45. This not only saves staff time and increases successful collections, it also preserves Joe’s satisfaction by eliminating unnecessary phone calls when he is likely to pay. Joe expected the hospital’s clinical staff to be responsive to his medical needs. When he found that the revenue cycle team was equally attentive to his financial needs, his satisfaction with the entire experience grew exponentially. It was fueled by a positive encounter that eased his mind about payment and allowed his to focus on his health. Using this proactive, personalized approach, the revenue cycle team had a major impact on both Joe’s experience and the bottom line. What is your healthcare organization doing to enhance the patient experience? Comment below to share some of your best practices.

Picture this: A movie trailer features a healthcare organization with a newly-minted portal through which patients access their private health information, make appointments and ask questions of their physician. The plot thickens as an unwelcomed guest looks for an identity to steal. With a few key strokes of a predictable password, the thief strikes gold, data is breached and the nightmare begins. From the patient standpoint, the Ponemon Institute® reports nearly 1.5 million Americans were affected by medical identity theft last year. And, those numbers are expected to rise as more hospitals add patient portals to comply with Meaningful Use Stage 2, which requires that more than 5% of all unique patients seen by the provider must be able to view, download, or transmit to a third party their health information. All this to say, organizations have the ability to proactively implement strategies to combat this concerning reality. To mitigate the risk of identity theft via a patient portal, healthcare organizations should consider a strategy to effectively control portal access beyond the basic user name and password. This type of heightened security via tools that combine state-of-the-art identity proofing, risk-based authentication and knowledge-based questions can help securely verify each patient’s identity. Such tools empower healthcare organizations to identify fraud more efficiently than traditional rules-based identity checks. Additionally, they provide the patient with a better online portal experience and greater peace of mind knowing that extra security measures are safeguarding their personal information. Don’t let a potential movie storyline dictate your reality. With industry experts predicting a 221 percent growth in the U.S. patient portal market by 2017, it’s time for healthcare organizations to partner with a trusted expert in fraud prevention to help them implement technologies that securely verify each patient’s identity. How secure is your patient portal?

There aren’t too many situations in which an individual purchases a product or service, but is NOT asked to pay for it right away. Healthcare, however, is somewhat unique in that regard, often avoiding a retail-based experience where patients receive service, but pay quite some time later, whether in full or the balance. Not surprisingly, this approach often times adversely impacts healthcare organizations in many ways. Best-case scenario, patient payments, while unpredictable, are received, but not in a timely manner and after a good deal of effort on the collections staff’s part. Worst-case scenario, the organization is left holding the proverbial bag, forced to write off bad debt, when payment could have been received if handled differently. In between, there are poor cash collections, increased revenue cycle costs and lower patient satisfaction. Organizations can avoid this perfect storm with a more precise approach to optimizing patient revenue. By leveraging tools that empower and improve upfront financial counseling communication, healthcare organizations stay one step ahead by accurately predicting patient responsibility payments and enhancing pre-service collections. When fueled by data and analytics, these tools offer a powerful two-pronged approach to minimizing risk and driving revenue: Avoid patient payment delays. Without knowing what insurance companies allow, many providers postpone collections until payer reimbursement is received. Healthcare organizations should instead have access to the latest contract terms, payment rules and fee schedules in order to identify patient and payer responsibility much earlier in the revenue cycle. Increase time-of-service collections. By proactively using patient payment data and current payer contract terms to calculate the amount owed by the patient at the time of service, organizations can effectively collect either a portion or all of that payment upfront. In the end, data-driven estimates of patient payment responsibility allow healthcare organizations to capture more revenue at the right time and boost cash flow. An added bonus is enhanced patient satisfaction because there are no confusing bills or ongoing collections calls, enabling a more personal experience for the patient. Hospitals have an opportunity to use data and analytics to improve the revenue stream and patient satisfaction. Learn about how Experian Healthcare Patient Responsibility Pricer can improve your collections on the front end of the revenue cycle and enhance the overall the patient experience.