Billing Tips for Family Practice Physicians in Texas

Did you know that family practice physicians lose around 10-20% revenue every year due to coding errors? 2014 has been a busy year for the family physicians. Constant changes in the insurance and government rules have been keeping them on their toes.

The challenges related to medical billing and coding have also affected their revenue collection. Minor errors such as underscoring, untimely claims submission, modifier emission, and inaccurate documentation have been proving detrimental to the revenue cycle of many family practices in Texas and various other states in the US.

• The rate at which Medicare pays family physicians, around $8,396 a year will be lost if the coders underscore just one level for four visits a day

Many family practices are dealing with an increased number of patients in a short time span with very less fee. This has put a question mark on their existence in the healthcare industry. Considering the revenue challenges, it has become important for them to spruce up their billing process so that regularity in payment from the insurance companies can be ensured.

Is your practice also facing revenue challenges due to billing inefficiencies? If the answer is yes, you need to consider the following measures to deal with these medical billing issues:

• Avoid documentation inaccuracy -
  If there are errors in the documentation, coders will not be able to assign appropriate codes. To ensure error-free coding, billing and timely claims submission, family physicians should invest sufficient time to document their rendered services in an accurate manner
• Hire, train and retain -
  No matter how accurate your documentation is if your coders and billers are not trained, error-free claims submission will not be possible. Similar to other medical specialties, family physicians also need to create a team of certified, well-trained billing staff who can handle all types of billing and coding complexities
• HIPAA compliance -
  Family practice billing procedure should comply with HIPAA and other reforms. Physicians should be careful in selecting and implementing health IT. The necessary training should also be given to the billing staff on how to use the latest technologies

The coders at your family practice should ensure that encounter forms (that capture all charges) are updated, appropriate E/M services are selected and documented, and charges are captured for every rendered service.

Why Outsource Family Practice Billing Services?

As the physician-patient ratio has grown, family physicians are not getting sufficient time to concentrate on the billing tasks. Reduced reimbursement from the government is posing a challenge for them to implement the latest health IT and hiring experienced coders and billers. To avoid potential disruptions in their revenue cycle, many physicians have started outsourcing their family practice billing services in Texas.

By choosing to outsource family practice billing services, providers have been able to concentrate better on patient care. Companies such as MedicalBillersandCoders.com have been offering effective family practice billing services in Texas to help physicians make more money while offering quality care. MBC’s expert team of certified and experienced coders and billers ensure that family physicians get paid for every rendered service. Their billing team stays updated with the latest technology and industry information related to family physicians.

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Published By - Medical Billers and Coders
Published Date - Nov-28-2014 Back