One of the toughest operations for a radiology office is the process of trying to recover bad debt from patients that weren’t able to complete the full payment of their statement balance. This complex form of healthcare collection and patient billing can put quite the strain on a business that has the burden of extreme overhead costs.
Let’s just put you in your patient’s shoes. You go into your local radiology clinic and have magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) done. Your medical provider then uses these scans to diagnose and, ultimately, treat the disease or injury you came in to see them for. A little while later you receive a patient bill from a physician or an organization that you have never even heard of before. You can imagine the confusion.
Educating the patient as to why they are receiving a radiology billing statement from a third party company is very important. This is most apparent in terms of having a solid understanding from the beginning of the process through to the end when their bill is paid in full.
When a system needs to be reevaluated to catch up with modern efficiency, the first term that might come to mind is innovation. It is extremely important to answer both the question of “How are you able to recover radiology bad debt that respects the patient?” as well as “How are we also able to track our recovery efforts in a strategic way?”
Emerald AR has designed a collection service that has innovation at its core. We have a modern approach to answer how to recover bad debt that respects the patient while seeking maximum recovery through analytics.
It is widely known in the medical debt recovery industry that most collection agencies are utilizing an approach that is largely out of date. These out of date practices are also responsible for tainting the industry’s reputation of employing suspicious and, at times, unethical radiology bad debt recovery applications.
Here at Emerald AR, we like to think of ourselves as not just another collection agency looking to get a past patient’s bad debt at all costs. Over the years, we have become a valued partner for many healthcare providers and we believe it is our approach that makes us different.
Unfortunately, Paydar hasn’t been invented yet, but you can get close with Emerald AR’s Gem Score.
Click below for a Free Propensity-to-Pay Analysis and better understand your patients’ bad debt as well as your likelihood to recover that debt!
When calls are placed to past and present radiology patients, your organization’s name and reputation is always associated with these recovery call efforts. We understand that here at Emerald AR and care about your patient billing process and services. We feel that there should be a high level of customer service standards that should be adhered to in order to achieve that particular degree of professionalism.
Being one of the most important financial documents that one has, we look to treat credit bureau reports with close attention. In these crucial records, everything relating to the patient’s credit history is revealed as well as how they have managed their credit. Emerald AR enables individuals to opt into a thorough credit bureau reporting service. This service informs radiology patients about any further delay in paying the amount due is going to result in the reporting of a bad debt collection account balance over to the credit bureau.
The technology Emerald AR has in place increases the revenue recovered from Medicaid. At the same time, we are eliminating balances that cannot be collected from assigned patients. By identifying the accounts that may be recovered through Medicaid, our technology is able to return the patient billing details for processing. This fail-safe billing process reduces your uncompensated care.
Keep in mind that it is illegal in many states for Medicaid providers to bill patients for medical treatment that is covered by Medicaid. With Emerald’s technology, healthcare providers are able to maximize the recovery of locating patients that are eligible for Medicaid within the appropriate filing limits while also keeping the providers compliant.
For one FQHC client alone, Emerald AR found over $250k in unbilled Medicaid within the first 90 days.
Find out how much your radiology office is missing out on and click the button below for a Free Medicaid Eligibility Scan!
Compliance is always a focal point of Emerald AR’s bad debt recovery process along with the actual patient themselves. Our collection letter service for radiology is focused on a communication procedure that is designed to operate as clear, concise, correct and always patient friendly.
These letters are written and formatted to be very easily read and understood. Their clear language enables patients to quickly determine why they have received the statement. It is also makes it clear how the radiology statement can be resolved by providing a clearcut direction as to how the patient is able to pay their balance online, through the mail, or over the phone.
It can be nearly impossible to obtain up-to-date contact information without a modern skip tracing system. This can cause a friction point and really hinder the bad debt recovery process in the healthcare field. If you try to contact that has inaccurate information, you’re efforts are both wasted and lost in the quest to collect on a patient balance.
When Emerald AR attempts a call that results in a disconnected number or receives a returned notice, our workflow management engine is designed to trigger our advanced skip tracing service to return the most up-to-date phone number for eligible accounts. Emerald then updates the customer’s records and continues with the collection process.
Here at Emerald AR, we understand the time and effort associated when working with attorneys, estate trustees or having to follow up on patient Medicaid eligibility. Emerald wants to make these interactions much easier which is why we offer additional services that will help to alleviate some of these pain points and reduce your workload.
The probate service offered by Emerald AR allows healthcare organizations to proactively identify deceased accounts, find probated estates, and efficiently file claims.
Emerald delivers a full service bankruptcy solution that ensures accurate and timely claims are filed to improve the recovery rate and decrease operational costs of wasted collection efforts.
