| |
| |
|
Medicine Information |
|
|
|
Medical Collections
Although you make a patient feel better, there isn't usually anything tangible to be a reminder of your service. When it comes time for the patient to pay their bills, yours is often at the bottom of the pile. You are competing with other credit grantors that supplied a tangible product, or something they really enjoy like cable or their cell phone and therefore your medical collections problem is more difficult. This is why it's important to learn as much as possible about your patient and make your credit policy clear before the medical service is actually given. This will help you minimize future medical collections problems. This is when the patient is most likely to be cooperative. The information you should obtain is as follows: > Patients full name and birth date > The full name of the person financially responsible for the patient, full address, phone numbers for home, work, and a relative. > Social Security number > Present employer, job title, name of supervisor, address, & phone number > Name and address of insurance company You should also verify insurance information at this time if possible. PREDICTING POTENTIAL MEDICAL COLLECTIONS PROBLEMS Here are some things to look for that will help predict a potential medical collections problem: Has the patient had several jobs in a short period of time? Has the patient moved often? Is the patient having personal problems? Does the patient have a phone? MEDICAL COLLECTIONS SCHEDULES AND PAYMENT ARRANGEMENTS Some tips for billing and medical collections that have worked well for professional credit grantors are as follows: Ask for payment at the time of the treatment, if possible. If they have insurance, ask for payment of the portion of the bill that will not be covered by insurance. Provide an itemized statement within 30 days from their visit, if you cannot provide one at the time of treatment. Send another statement 30 days later. If no payment is received 14 days after the second statement has been sent, send a friendly reminder. Call if there is no response 10 days after the friendly reminder is sent. If there is still no response, send a final letter explaining that the account is being placed for medical collections. WHAT NOW? There is a limit to the amount of time and effort that you should spend trying to collect on your past due medical accounts. You will know that any further medical collections efforts on your part will be unsuccessful if any of the following occurs: No response to your statements, letters and phone calls Missing scheduled payments as per your arrangement, for no reason Repeated complaints Starts denying responsibility Mail is returned and you don't have a valid address Marital difficulties Phone is disconnected and there is no new listing Job loss If any of these problems occur, you should place the account for medical collections immediately, the longer you wait the more difficult it is to collect or locate the debtor. DOING MEDICAL COLLECTIONS YOURSELF Some healthcare professionals, hospitals and clinics feel that they can collect past-due accounts themselves. This could save the fee charged by a medical collections service. Some of the costs involved in doing it yourself are: Salaries - A medical collections supervisor and collectors will have to be paid. Telephones - Collectors spend a lot of time on the phone, some of these calls will be long distance. Postage - Collectors send a lot of notices and verifications of bills and there will be a large increase in postage. Computers, Software & Other Equipment - This could involve a big initial investment. Also, you may need to be able to do some skip tracing, and credit reporting on these patients. Training - Collectors need to know the laws in the state you are located and also follow the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. They may need to be trained in skip tracing, collection techniques and letter writing. Things to look out for when collecting yourself: Make sure your medical collections staff is thoroughly trained in consumer debt counseling, state and federal credit and collection laws. Do not spend too much time, which is money, on pursuing accounts that you don't feel you will collect on. Have at least one collector who is familiar with small claims procedures. Collection Agency Outsourcing offers you free information on collection agencies and debt collections issues.
MORE RESOURCES:
Medicine - Google News |
|
|
|
RELATED ARTICLES
A Fresh Start Plan for People With Neck Pain! "If you have to deal with chronic neck pain, it can be a real struggle. I know? because I've had to do it myself," states Dr. SUPERLASIK- Enhance Your Vision; Safer Than LASIK Things are moving forward and new and advanced procedures are being developed for those who originally could not receive the standard Lasik procedure. Dr. Irritable Bowel Syndrome - Cybill Shepherd Reveals All Cybill Shepherd has revealed that she suffers from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). The star of Moonlighting and Taxi Driver says that she has struggled with her symptoms for many years, and is now hoping to raise awareness of IBS and encourage sufferers to talk more openly with their doctors. Serevent Side Effects Put Serevent in Top 5 Most Dangerous Drugs Serevent is an asthma inhalation medication, a bronchodilator, that relaxes the muscles in airways. It is preventative and not effective when taken during an asthma attack. What Not to Tell Your Doctor? For many years since medicine has been established as an ethical profession and gained widespread credence people have believed that they could and should tell their doctor everything even remotely pertinent to their health and that it was held in the strictest confidence. Furthermore, how can the physician make accurate judgments when important or significant information is missing? This system worked very well until relatively recently but there now exists a breach of this confidence that people should know about and this breach has developed from the advent of third party investigations into people's backgrounds. Hypothermia - The Cold Facts If you ever go to cold countries, you should undoubtedly have heard of Hypothermia. If you haven't, you should learn something about it. Eliminate Agonizing Hand Pain Quickly and Easily! According to Dr. Nathan Wei, "The hand and wrist are the mirrors of disease. Dr. Will Horsley, M.D. Dr. Horsley is Cornea fellowship trained and Lasik board certified by the American Board of Eye Surgeons, (http://www. How to Make Changes in Your Healthcare Organization For many of us change is a difficult process. In organizations like healthcare it seems to advance at a snail's pace sometimes. Bextra and Vioxx Withdrawal Spurs Price Increase Among Rivals The market for painkillers is huge. People don't like pain and inflammation, and last year Americans spent nearly $4 billion on just two of them - Vioxx and Bextra. Redux Lawyer Discusses Fen-Phen Fad In the early nineties, Redux was the original miracle diet pill. A predecessor to fenphen, Redux was just the "fen", fenfluramine in the form dexfenfluramine. To Buy Pain Meds Online, a Dangerous Move Many people want to buy pain meds online simply because it is cheaper for them. Recently, thousands of online pharmacies have popped up offering for people to buy pain meds online without a prescription. Testosterone Therapy in XXI Century Nowadays many people are familiar with the appellation of "low testosterone level". What does it mean? It mean that male body produce less amounts of this hormone than necessary. "Do you suffer from Osteoarthritis? Here's how to tell!" The most common type of arthritis is osteoarthritis (OA). This type of arthritis is commonly referred to as wear and tear arthritis or degenerative arthritis. Common Drugs and Their Uses The five drugs that are discussed in this article are Ibuprofen which is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) that is commonly used for relief of Arthritis, Warfarin which is an anticoagulant drug commonly prescribed by doctors to treat venous thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, to treat or prevent dangerous blood clotting in people with arterial fibrillation and to prevent strokes, a benzodiazepine drug called Diazepam which is commonly prescribed by doctors for relieve nervousness, anxiety, and anxiety disorders, a sulfonylureas drug called Glipizide which is used to help control blood sugar levels and used to treat type 2 diabetes and a thyroid medication called Armour Thyroid which is prescribed for the treatment of hypothyroidism.Arthritis is a common illness in today's society; doctors prescribe drugs called non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) for this condition. Are You Suffering From Addiction? Many researchers believe that addiction is a behavior that can be controlled to some extent and also a brain disease. And since some testing with functional magnetic resonance imaging (FMRI) found that all addictions tend to cause nearly the same reactions inside the brain, there could be one type of control model for addiction health-related issues. Why Drug Companies are Naughty and 5 Remedies to Cure the Symptoms With the hum of the election campaign and the debate of "big business," versus human interest, I decided to do a bit of muckraking into the art and science of the recent removal of Merck's Vioxx. My motivation of course; to look for clues as to the role drug companies play in our health and wellness (or lack thereof). Aleve, Vioxx, Celebrex, and Bextra: What You Need To Know About Arthritis Pain Medications Recent controversy about the safety of pain medications for arthritis has left patients and health care professionals alike confused about which medications are safe to use. In fact, a recent survey by the Boston-based Rippe Lifestyle Institute indicated that many people with arthritis are suffering unnecessarily because they have stopped or reduced their use of pain relievers due to confusion about which drugs are considered safe. Clinton on South Beach Diet Clinton's recent quadruple bypass surgery has been largely debated. Being on the South Beach Diet made everybody wonder how the former president's illness advanced so much as to need to be surgically corrected. Be Informed About The Medications You Take The recent withdrawal of the prescription drugs Vioxx and Bextra have arthritis patients concerned about their health, lawyers busy with lawsuits, and Congress poring over thousands of pages of documents obtained from the manufacturer. The drugs, part of a family of medications known as COX-2 inhibitors, have recently been shown to increase the risk of heart attacks and strokes among users who take the drugs for long periods of time.
|
| home | site map | Dr. Thad Thomas |
| © 2006 |
