Automating your business can be a daunting task for any healthcare organization, especially when you are established in your systems and operations. But when your business reaches the point of growth expansion, how do you attain your business goals while expanding your practice? Today we’re talking with Kyle Hart, ImagineSoftware’s VP of Integration Success, to see how automation can benefit your practice.
When practices want to automate their business it’s usually because of one or two reasons: they have too much business to continue manually processing their remits, claims, payments and postings; or they’ve hit a bottleneck in the back end of their system. When a healthcare practice switches from manual to automated processing there are some obvious and important questions to ask.
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1. Do I have to implement automation right away?
Absolutely not. If your practice is currently dealing with mountains of paperwork and remits, you can start by working with a paperless system that simplifies and streamlines your process. A top-notch billing system will be able to acquire data from FTP’s and process them, produce claims and submit them, pull payments and process them – while you focus on what matters.
The difference with automation is that you can move from doing the work in a paperless system to not having to do the work at all by setting up automation from the beginning. When you begin working with a solution like ImagineAppliance, not only are you working with a world-class billing system, you engage an automation platform that can do everything from acquiring your source data, processing, posting and submitting during the day and while you sleep.
2. How much business can the automated system handle?
A best in class billing system has virtually unlimited capabilities. If you are running a fully configured and automated Imagine system, you should only need 1 person for every 4 physicians in your office. With the demand for full cycle revenue management services increasing, it’s important to choose a partner that stays on top of industry trends, government regulations and automation procedures.
Most hospitals don’t have the revenue to continually invest in new technology, so partnering with a billing software company that provides seamless updates, has dedicated support, and implements new features gives your facility a competitive advantage.
3. How will automation effect my full-time employees?
At Imagine, we’re not in the business of replacing people for technology. Automation will reduce the number of man hours spent on your billing process, but that means it will free up your best employees to better serve your patients. We’ve had and always will have a “people first” mindset, meaning that if Sally has been with you for 30 years, we’re not looking for automation to replace her. Rather, we’re asking “Where can you reallocate her to best serve your patients?” Could she help be the face of your organization and add empathy to your practice? Since she’s worked with benefits, she may be valuable to employ as a benefit advisor, so your patients have a knowledgeable resource to ask questions regarding their coverage, or place Sally with the A/R follow up team to call and collect more from your payers.
Automation is focused towards removing the remedial and mundane tasks in the billing process, reducing denials and improving the efficiency of your office. If you think automation and a paperless billing process would benefit your practice get in touch with us today. We’d love to answer any of your questions or give you a demo.