Are You Taking the Turns too Fast
By Wayne Miller, RRT, MBA

One IT enabled project speeding by right after another – or so it feels like it some days. You are in the midst of your next big IT adventure when BAM!! You hit a wall! Unfortunately, you discover there are a couple of areas which should have had more attention during the early planning stages of your revenue cycle process. Early diagnosis of issues can mean the difference between success and failure of your project.

The critical areas highlighted below include upfront cash collections and capacity management. Both processes are ripe for improvement but are dependent upon understanding your current revenue cycle practices and having the ability to delve deep enough to uncover hidden road blocks to success.

Upfront cash collections are a critical part of your revenue cycle specifically in the area of self pays, which includes co-payments and deductibles. These days, employer’s benefits packages tend to include higher co-pays and deductibles, which if collected up front will pay dividends in the end. To garner more positive results, consider making modifications to your registration system to enable upfront collections during the registration process. Include various payment processing options like credit cards and cash. Depending on the situation another modification would be to indicate and request financial counseling to assist with the appropriate payment plans. Another possibility would be rescheduling the procedure until payment can be made depending on the circumstance. Some facilities are even considering placing property liens to leverage or assist in the collection of unpaid bills.

Capacity management which includes patient throughput within the facility needs to be continuously monitored and improved.

To achieve this goal:

• Consider monitoring bed turnover coordinated with housekeeping via telephony or digital pagers
• Track patient location movement utilizing RFID
• Implement departmental patient check-in/check-out as a result of a sophisticated patient tracking system.

Many companies provide “bolt-on” functionality to address the above areas and hospitals are starting to see the advantage of their investment in comparison to making huge capital investments in physical construction.

For both of these processes: upfront cash collections and capacity management, assessing your current strategic plans to include changes in your information system is critical. Both your revenue cycle and clinical information systems are integrally linked to your future success, so they deserve special attention.

Understanding your current workflow, documenting what information is gathered and stored in your existing information system and your information system’s ability to retrieve the information, will be necessary when developing your strategic revenue cycle IS plans.

Remember, even though you may feel like you are driving in the Daytona 500 you will need to slow down and assess the upcoming turns to make sure you do not jeopardize your cash flow!!

If you would like more information on our McKesson practice or assistance with upcoming IT enabled projects, please feel free to contact me at vcs@getvitalized.com. You can also reach me at (610) 444 1233. Our website has additional newsletter and articles that may be helpful. Visit our site at www.getvitalized.com.