For clinicians working in the complex American healthcare system, getting paid for every single procedure, service and visit has always been something of a challenge. Yes, fee-for-service medicine created a fairly linear relationship between effort and remuneration, but even in that scenario many hospitals and practices have teetered on the edge of solvency, in part for lack of efficient billing practices.
You may be suffering from IT security fatigue at this point, for which I offer a half-hearted apology.
Yes, only half-hearted, because the numbers say healthcare is aware of various security threats but still remains vulnerable, making it imperative that the subject stay top of mind until patient data is reliably protected.
Patient engagement is easy, right? Just create a portal and tell patients it’s there.
Of course, no one who puts a little thought into this idea believes it can be so simple. Healthcare isn’t “Field of Dreams,” after all. We can build it. They still might not come.
Have the HIPAA security and privacy rules been around so long they fade into the background? Perhaps so, which could be problematic. You see, the 2013 Omnibus HIPAA Rule strictly defines the liability and obligations of all business associates, which vendors with access to PHI must understand. As must providers, many of whom are still using pre-2013 business associate agreements. Along with general liability and obligations for business associates, the Omnibus Rule also expands financial liability and enforcement, and introduces altogether new privacy and security provisions.
If you’re looking for greater efficiency, effective operations and increased billing, practice management systems (PMS) are proven to meet those requirements.
But not all solutions are the same. If you’re shopping for a PMS, make sure you get the functionality that truly makes your practice better by looking for these ten characteristics:
Naturally, most of what you hear from healthcare IT companies about their products is going to be upbeat, designed to create a sense of potential and promise. I mean, I can easily extol the virtues of the company I lead and the products and services we sell.
Mathematically, the gap between $3.6 million and $17,000 is a chasm.
This is something you know well if you’re Hollywood Presbyterian Hospital, which paid the latter number to unlock patient data held hostage by malicious hackers using ransomware when the former number is what the hackers initially asked for.
For behavioral health hospitals that don’t yet have an EHR and think they can’t afford one without financial assistance, the wait for federal government support continues.
In a world where only the wealthy suffered from addiction, we wouldn’t have to worry so much about the effectiveness of treatment or who was going to pay for it.
But most people don’t live in Malibu or have access to Betty Ford, so efficacy matters.
Especially to insurance organizations, including the federal government, which have become increasingly more hesitant in recent years to pay for inpatient addiction treatment when it seems no one can demonstrate what actually works.
Imagine you’re living in Brooklyn and you have a medical emergency. If the hospital nearest you, say Lutheran Medical Center, were to close, you could go to Maimonides or New York Methodist a short taxi or ambulance ride away.
The new Medsphere …
inspired IT solutions for every healthcare provider
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Carlsbad, CA 92008
Ph: 760-692-3700
Fx: 760-683-3701
contact@medsphere.com