Laboratories are distinct from other healthcare facilities and often face unique challenges when it comes to billing. These problems may arise from various factors, including changing patient volume, evolving compliance guidelines, and a dim view of revenue analytics.
The Major Reasons to hiring laboratory billing companies;
Cost-effectiveness
Laboratories can benefit from outsourcing lab billing services due to their cost-effectiveness. Instead of hiring in-house employees, you can hire a laboratory billing company with state-of-the-art infrastructure and specialised experts.
Moreover, outsourcing lab billing ensures that medical claims are processed promptly to maximise reimbursements. This can help lower your days in accounts receivable and reduce your write-offs.
It also allows you to concentrate on other important areas of your business. The right billing solution can also provide you with monthly analytical reports that help identify areas of potential improvement in your laboratory’s revenue cycle management.
For example, if your laboratory is struggling with payer criteria or a high patient financial responsibility for healthcare costs, it’s crucial to take action. This includes optimising cash collection to avoid revenue loss, implementing new back-end billing procedures to manage client billing, and creating a system that enables you to track all aspects of your billing process.
Time-saving
Billing is an important part of any healthcare business, but it’s often overlooked. It can also be a difficult process to manage, particularly when changes in regulations and insurance policies affect your lab.
Hiring an external laboratory billing company can help you keep track of these changes and ensure that your team is ready to process them efficiently.
Moreover, they can also help you avoid costly errors that could impact insurance reimbursements. These experts know the intricacies of lab billing and can help you avoid common mistakes that lead to denials, delays, and lost revenue.
By partnering with a professional lab billing agency, you can reduce the time your laboratory spends on administrative tasks and focus more on patient care. They also save money on operational costs and provide a reliable billing service that improves your cash flow.
Patient Satisfaction
Patient satisfaction is a metric that has become increasingly important in healthcare as reimbursement and performance policies have grown more complex. However, the measurement of patient satisfaction is often challenging due to the multitude of contributing factors and lack of consistent terminology.
One of the most important ways to increase patient satisfaction is through provider communication. Practitioners who take the time to address patients’ concerns and fears early on can help reduce patient anxiety and improve their ability to retain key clinical information.
In addition, a positive patient experience can lead to increased staff retention and improved performance. Investing in your staff and providing them with the resources they need can help them provide the highest quality care possible. This will ultimately lead to higher patient satisfaction scores and greater profitability.
HIPAA compliance
It is important to choose a medical billing partner that is up to date on government regulations, is HIPAA compliant, and has security protocols in place to protect patient privacy. It is also important to consider how they plan to handle patient billing questions and concerns.
In the case of a patient who requests access to their test reports, the laboratory must verify that the person has the authority to make the request on the individual’s behalf. This may be done by having the person present a written health care power of attorney, the general power of attorney, or durable power of attorney that includes the power to make health care decisions, proof of legal guardianship, or other documentation of the individual’s status as the personal representative.
In addition to verifying that the person has the requisite authority, the laboratory must provide direct access to the test report as required by the Privacy Rule. This may be done by providing the person with a copy of the test report or by transmitting an electronic copy of the test report to the individual.