Chip and I continue our discussion on key reports we ought to be looking at when assessing the financial health of our practices. In this AwesomeCast, Chip and I talk about E/M distribution, specifically the 9921x and how looking at these CPT codes and comparing with each other can provide a lot of insight into the clinic's billing practices, among other things. We also talk about Sick to Wellness ratio. Chip walks us through his process on … [Read more...]
#8 Key Metrics We Should Use to Gauge the Financial Health of Our Medical Practice, Part II [Practice Management VideoCast]
April 17, 2013 By 1 Comment
How Many Billers Should A Medical Practice Employ?
April 3, 2013 By 8 Comments
We've talked about in-house billing vs outside billing before. I even teamed up with my friend Chip Hart and devoted a full podcast to the topic. But we've never talked about billing staff ratios. How many billing staff should we have? How do we know if we are understaffed or overstaff? Should we calculate the ratio based on charges and collections or should we base it on physician count? Dr. Suzanne Berman, one of the many outstanding … [Read more...]
#4: Front Desk Benchmarking [Practice Management VideoCast]
January 16, 2013 By 5 Comments
Chip and I recorded our 4th episode of our Pediatric Practice Management VideoCast. In this episode, Chip and I talk about benchmarking, specifically front desk benchmarking. I have a little hard time with benchmarking data. Mostly because I can't pin point how I feel about them. In the video I explain my feelings, so you'll have to watch to learn the details. I also share how I go about benchmarking in our practice. Although I've never … [Read more...]
How to Decide on a Collection Company For Your Medical Practice
November 28, 2012 By 2 Comments
In our experience, collection companies do very little to help out with collection efforts. For starters, pediatricians' medical offices balances are generally small when compared to hospital charges, ER charges or even surgery charges. If you were in the collection business and got a commission for your efforts, would you try to collect on $10,000 or $100? In other words, our accounts are not high on the priority list. I also think that by … [Read more...]
Providing Breastfeeding Services Finally Pays Dividends
August 29, 2012 By 10 Comments
Regardless of whether you agree or disagree with the politics of the Affordable Care Act, the truth is that there are some things in it that are very encouraging. Among them is a section that talks about insurance companies being required to cover for breastfeeding services. For a pediatric practice, looking to incorporate lactation consultants, this is a good thing. To give us a better understanding of how this part of the ACA works, and … [Read more...]
Leaving a Hospital Job to Start a Solo Practice
August 22, 2012 By 3 Comments
Dr. Lois Freisleben-Cook is a pediatrician that started her practice after completing a two year contract with the local hospital. These days, you don’t hear about too many docs leaving hospital jobs to open up solo practices, so I wanted to learn amount what many consider to be a rare, dying breed of doctors. I reached out to Dr. Freisleben-Cook and asked her if I could ask some questions regarding her experience as a solo rural doc. She … [Read more...]
I Don’t Know How Else To Put This, But My Ebook Is Kind of a Big Deal
May 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment
If you are a regular reader of this blog, you probably know about my e-book, 101 Ways to Transform Your Practice. If you haven’t picked it up (it is free by the way) I wanted to give you a little nudge to do so. Not everything in the ebook is going to work in your practice. But at the very least, I think the ebook will spark ideas that you would have not had otherwise. If you are still not convinced, then let me share this little … [Read more...]
Medical Billing Behind the Scenes
September 28, 2011 By 3 Comments
I wrote the blog post below on the Survivor Pediatrics blog titled “What I wish parents Knew about Medical Billing”. I didn’t post it here on PediatricInc because placing it here would have been like preaching to the choir. To my surprise, the post has gotten a lot of attention and I’ve received a lot of great feedback from people in the healthcare industry (those that actually live this day by day) as well as non-clinical or … [Read more...]
Do You Have In House Billing Or Do You Outsource It?
July 18, 2010 By 2 Comments
People often ask me if we have billing in-house or if we outsource it. And I tell people we have a hybrid model. … [Read more...]
I'm a practice administrator at a Pediatric office located in the western suburbs of Chicago. I write mostly about running a small business that happens to be a medical practice.
