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There’s a phenomenon in online product reviews where the customer seems to love their purchase, yet gives it only one or two stars. Why do they do this? Poor customer service: the item was delivered late, questions went unanswered, or payment processing was disorganized. When the consumer experience falls below expectations, the brand suffers – no matter how good the product. The same thing happens in healthcare. The clinical care may be outstanding, but if the patient finds billing frustrating or confusing, it’s those feelings they’ll associate with the overall experience. Many healthcare providers suffer reputational damage because the patient financial experience fails to match high quality clinical care. This is especially true for patients who find themselves without coverage and in need of financial assistance, which is often an extremely stressful process. And with unemployment levels soaring as a result of the coronavirus pandemic, it’s likely more Americans will need to explore eligibility for charitable support. Finding smarter, speedier and scalable ways to check charity care eligibility is even more important. Using automation for faster charity care checks Automation may be the answer. With a system that runs checks quickly and easily against vast databases of up-to-the-minute records, providers can discover a patient’s propensity to pay before treatment is even carried out. Clarity from the outset ensures the patient is put on the right payment pathway and lays the groundwork for a positive patient financial experience. Caye Mauney, Patient Access Director for Palo Pinto General Hospital, tells us how her organization used data-driven financial clearance checks to improve the patient financial experience and reduce bad debt: Speeding up checks for earlier eligibility decisions Prior to using automation, Palo Pinto General used a time-consuming and labor-intensive paper-based process to determine a patient’s eligibility for charity assistance. But with automated screening prior to or at the point of service, the hospital can now verify whether patients qualify for charitable assistance within three seconds, and quickly connect them to the right program. For those with a self-pay amount, a Healthcare Financial Risk Score can be calculated using historical payments information and credit history, to help determine the optimal payment plan. Mauney says: “All the information we need is now at our fingertips. The patient no longer needs to bring in check stubs or go back to a former employer to ask for information. It’s been a game changer.” Creating a personalized patient experience At Palo Pinto, staff wanted to make sure that patients were taken care of not only medically, but financially too. Just as each patient needs medical care tailored to their individual needs, so too should their financial accounts be handled on a case by case basis. With custom payment plans based on an individual’s unique financial situation, the payment process can be transformed into an experience that patients no longer dread or avoid. Automated patient clearance checks draw on multiple sources of data and run analytics to quickly determine the best option for each patient. It can also generate scripts for patient advocates to use, to help patients navigate the process more easily. Palo Pinto reports improvements in patient satisfaction and trust as a result of uncomplicating the patient experience in this way. Reducing bad debt and increasing point-of-service collections Seamlessly connecting patients to the right financial assistance program allows patients to focus on their treatment, while feeling reassured that their financial obligations will be met. For providers, swift processing means decisions are made quickly, resulting in fewer accounts receivable delays and a lower risk of uncompensated care. At Palo Pinto General, quicker charity applications means more are being approved, and therefore not written off as bad debt – ultimately helping their bottom line. Discover how automating checks for charity care eligibility with Patient Financial Clearance can help your organization increase productivity, improve collections and boost patient satisfaction.

The term “digital front door” is one of the biggest buzz words in healthcare, and thanks to COVID-19, we can expect to see it even more. Already, according to an Accenture survey, 77 percent of patients believe the ability to book, cancel, or change an appointment online is important. Now, with social distancing and stay at home orders in place, offering digital tools for engagement is more important than ever. But what exactly makes a strong “digital front door” and what does it take to create one? What precisely does a digital strategy need in order to better engage and retain patients? There are a lot of thoughts about what the digital front door looks like, from pricing transparency to ratings and reviews, reputation management, patient registration, and more. We know patients today are seeking greater transparency from their entire healthcare experience. Yet each of the qualities above reflect more of a digital billboard than an actual front door. After all, the front door needs to be a pathway to see a physician or access care; it must actually “open.” A true digital front door will do the following: Enable omni-channel access. Improving access begins with offering more channels for patients to find the care they need – a necessity today in the midst of COVID-19. Digital scheduling drives patient access, plain and simple, whether it be through call centers, automated outreach, or online self-scheduling. Omni-channel access not only opens the door for patients experiencing COVID-19 symptoms, giving them a fast and easy way to connect with a provider, but will be key for the post-COVID world when patients begin to reschedule those appointments that have been cancelled or deferred. Engage patients. Patients want convenience when it comes to accessing care. Now, more than ever, patients look online for information and expect to find what they need easily and quickly. Making service information available online, such as COVID testing, is an obvious first step. Allowing consumers to simply and efficiently book the care they need online will lead to increased engagement, as well. Improve productivity. More than half of all patients prefer to schedule outside of business hours. Digital scheduling can enable that, increasing appointments while improving provider workflow, freeing up staff to focus on other activities. This will prove critical as providers brace for an influx of patients seeking to reschedule appointments that have since been cancelled or deferred due to COVID-19. Additionally, automated reminders help improve patient show rates while data-driven practices help refine scheduling logistics.  Increase revenue. Providing better, more efficient access, increases the number of patients coming into a practice – which means more revenue. And today, as a result of heroic efforts to serve communities impacted by COVID-19, providers are more strapped for revenue than ever before. With access to digital and mobile solutions, providers can attack revenue loss from two sides –attracting new patients and retaining current ones. Drive higher patient satisfaction. Faster, easier access to healthcare equals better satisfaction with the process of accessing healthcare, with the provider organization, and with the provider. And, if you really want a crowd pleaser that can also generate revenue, automated business rules and scheduling protocols are a must have.It’s the combination of convenience and effectiveness that keeps them coming back for future care needs – coming back, of course, through the digital front door. Learn more about how Patient Scheduling can help to unlock your organization’s digital front door.

There’s an identity matching challenge that’s existed in healthcare ever since the move to electronic medical records began, and the urgency to remedy it has been increased by the speed and danger posed by COVID-19. How do you identify a patient with limited information? How do you know what medical record or lab test to associate with a patient? Capturing complete or accurate patient demographic information is difficult and can be impacted by many factors far less chaotic than a pandemic. By any measure, under normal circumstances, hospital registration takes place in a fast-paced environment. “Normal” changed abruptly for the United States in March and the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) recognized the need to enable innovations that will help keep pace with the virus’ relentless pace. OCR announced in early April that it would exercise its enforcement discretion and not impose penalties against covered health care providers or their business associates for uses and disclosures of protected health information by business associates for public health and health oversight activities during the Covid-19 nationwide public health emergency. The COVID-19 Identity Challenge Pop-up and parking lot testing sites provide little opportunity for healthcare staff to follow typical patient intake processes or access the technology and tools used in their hospitals and medical offices for registration. Information is gathered with everything from pen and paper to tablet devices; however, these methods are challenged to collect a patient’s information while maintaining social distancing requirements. This often results in incomplete or inaccurate patient information, making patient follow-up near impossible – not knowing who to contact or where to contact them.   The number of positive COVID-19 cases continues to grow and public health officials at the federal, state, county, and local level have an urgent need to understand and describe how the virus is spreading, and effectively support impacted individuals. In accordance with OCR’s announcement, Experian Health will provide individuals who meet the public health authority definition free access to certain features of its Universal Identity Manager (UIM) product to assist with filling in missing patient demographics.  Any access to UIM services (and the PHI therein) is limited only to public health authorities and only until the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services declares the public health emergency no longer exists or upon the expiration date of the public health emergency1. For additional information on the UIM, please visit our website. This is a step that Experian Health is proud to take, playing our part in combatting the outbreak of Covid-19 and expediting the country’s path to recovery. 1. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 45 CFR Parts 160 and 164 Notification of Enforcement Discretion under HIPAA to Allow Uses and Disclosures of Protected Health Information by Business Associates for Public Health and Health Oversight Activities in Response to COVID-19 https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/notification-enforcement-discretion-hipaa.pdf