President Trump released his proposed fiscal year 2018 budget today. It includes several sizeable cuts to various sectors of the healthcare industry. According to the Health Affairs blog, “Over the next ten years, the budget proposes cutting Obamacare” outlays by $1.25 trillion, resulting in $250...
One element of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) passed in 2015 was a mandated change to Medicare beneficiary identifiers. Currently, Medicare beneficiaries are identified by their social security number. The reason for the change is due to concern regarding identity theft. As reported...
There are many things to consider when you are trying to decide whether you should hire billing staff to help manage your revenue cycle, or outsource your revenue cycle to a firm that specializes in revenue cycle management. Oftentimes, outsourcing this critical piece of your...
By the time you’re reading this, you have likely received information from several other sources regarding the American Health Care Act (AHCA) that was passed by the House of Representatives on Thursday. The question is, what does this mean and what happens next? As of...
No matter your politics, we all had some anticipatory anxiety after the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law. It promised sweeping changes to our industry, and none of us knew for sure exactly how this would change the healthcare landscape. ...
April for speroMD means mid-year performance reviews! This week our management team is busy providing formalized feedback to their staff, and the same is happening in our physician practices as well. Medical practices are unique, but there are many elements, especially those that are related to...
We expect a lot out of our front desk staff. They are true multi-taskers. Because there is a great variety of critical tasks these individuals must perform daily to keep the office running smoothly, sometimes important tasks are not performed as you might expect. The...
Do you pay attention to the denials you receive from payors? How to you handle them in your office? Do you work all of them and look for patterns? Do you appeal your denials with the payors that processed them? This week, we want to provide...
An article in Crain’s Chicago Business this week highlighted several of the larger health systems in the Chicagoland area and the exchange that has occurred in their uncollectible debt from patients. As more patients have become insured, the amount of charity care provided has decreased,...
The main healthcare news that has been swirling this week has been related to the American Health Care Act – the bill that, as of the time of our publishing this blog is scheduled to go to the House floor for a vote today. In...