medical billing transcription supplier information

Ongoing industrywide challenges in the management of healthcare information are acute; some providers, insurers, and practice managers find them overwhelming. In fact, operational difficulties in processing and man aging medical records and billing information have only intensified in the current environment of managed healthcare reimbursement, complex claims processing, and compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996.

Common Challenges for Providers and Physicians

Today, staff at many healthcare organizations, including medical practices and medical management firms, still manually extract data from complicated explanation of benefits forms. This is an increasingly time-consuming task in the current managed care environment. Rekeying this information into IT systems often introduces clerical errors, especially when staff is working with numerous nonstandard forms from several insurance payers.

The sheer volume of EOB documentation and the need to archive and store documents for several years make document organization, storage, and retrieval expensive and labor intensive. Employees dread having to rum mage in dusty dungeons where paperwork is stored, occupying space that could be used better for other purposes. This document storage and retrieval problem also wastes worker and management hours.

Complicating matters is the fact that HIPAA requires that medical records remain confidential and secure. Unfortunately, as IT managers of visionary healthcare organizations everywhere have discovered, this requirement may collide with their desire to automate operations and coordinate patient information through transparent, practicewide information accessibility.

MaternOhio Takes Action

In the computerized business world, where connectivity is key, software solutions offer interfaces that effectively integrate functions, bringing new operational efficiencies to medical practices and other healthcare organizations. In fact, such automated solutions are increasingly critical in effective healthcare financial management.

The size, mission, and capabilities of Columbus, Ohio based MaternOhio Management Services made it ideal to pilot an innovation involving shared document imaging. The company was founded by ob/gyn physicians to facilitate a cooperative business model along specialty lines. Formed to streamline costs and share administrative support functions, it operates as a physicians' cooperative and allows members to select services according to their specific operational needs. It now serves 200 physicians, 140 of whom are ob/gyns. MaternOhio provides members with business support services such as contract negotiations with suppliers and vendors. In addition, because ob/gyn practitioners are particularly vulnerable to malpractice litigation, MaternOhio developed group risk sharing initiatives with insurers and carriers, and established its own malpractice insurance company.

To this forward-thinking firm, a patient payment and medical records system based on shared document imaging made sense from both operational and financial standpoints. Sharing the image across workstations, with different staff' members authorized to access and work with the imaged and linked documents, made more sense than continuing the all-too-familiar wasteful paper chase. MaternOhio staff hoped to use optical character-reading capacity for aspects of a patient's record other than EOB forms, searching and matching for Social Security numbers and medical records so all components would be cross-referenced, with no information standing alone and all information secure as required under HIPAA.

# posted by Medical Information : 12:00 AM