Harnessing Digital to Accelerate

With increasing patient financial responsibility, it is critical that care providers focus on effective patient communication strategies to improve patient collections. Transparent communication and patient education are some of the key components that drive successful patient collection, while enhancing their experiences in the process.

Revenue cycle teams are coming to grips with the reality that it costs two to three times as much to collect from patients as it does to collect from payors. It is essential that Hospitals and Practices carefully design their patient communication strategies to stay away from expensive programs that may lead to ineffective statements and calls that don’t pay off.

Enhancing Patient Communication

In today’s digital era, patient collection strategies need to focus on multiple factors beyond the conventional methods of deriving monies from the patient or the guarantor. Key strategies for patient collections include:

Point of Service

Point of Service or POS is one of the best times to collect monies that involve patient responsibility. It is also important that the admin staff has in-depth knowledge and understanding of the billing process, patient responsibility and the amount due, to effectively communicate the same to the patient. It is essential that the registration staff understands the patient’s historical information and other critical insurance details to convey the financial responsibility and offer the best recommendations specific to their insurance plans.

Patient Statements

An elaborate patient statement that is self-explanatory and transparent needs to be sent out to the patient/guarantor to convey the due medical bills. A well-designed patient statement has all the relevant information that a patient needs—starting from the care provider’s name, services offered to the medical expenses, payer payments and much more.

Statements do not always provide sufficient details about the bills that the patients are asked to pay. Patients are more likely to respond when the patient statement establishes a comprehensive view of the services offered.

Patient Follow-up

Patient follow-up programs are no more within the constraints of written forms of communication; they are interactive communication strategies that proactively reach out to the patients for better engagement and collaboration. Digital patient engagement solutions integrate analytics and AI-powered strategies to predict patients’ propensity to pay based on certain algorithms—that give deeper insights on patient follow-ups.

Online Care Coordination Solutions

Online payment methods are increasingly gaining popularity among patients—considering the convenience it brings to patient payments. Patient engagement platforms that integrate online payment features are gaining significance among patients, especially the millennials for the seamless payment solution that it offers. Just like the patient statements, it is essential that the online patient portals are well-orchestrated with detailed information on the nature of the bill. Data privacy and security are important components that needs to be considered—to ensure that patient data is stored and maintained by meeting the highest HIPAA compliance and data protection standards

Measuring Performance

Patient collection programs should essentially be integrated with KPIs to track and monitor the effectiveness of the programs—to make necessary adjustments to the goals or the methods of approach.

Hospitals and Practices are implementing new patient collection strategies to meet the evolving market trends. In today’s digital era, it is critical that medical billing services focus on digital patient payment strategies to optimize cash flow, while delivering positive patient financial experiences.

Also Read:

8 Ways to Optimize Patient Payment Collections and Increase Practice Revenues

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Digitizing Self-Pay Collection in Healthcare to Accelerate Providers’ Revenues

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How the Next-gen Patient Management Platforms Can Improve Patient Care

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3 Effective Ways Your Medical Billing Services Partner Can Boost Financial Efficiencies

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Creating Positive Financial Experiences in the World of Value-based Care

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To learn more about how SolvEdge’s comprehensive patient collection platform can accelerate your financial outcomes, talk to our team.