Revenue integrity critical to hospital execs

A new survey of hospital executives indicates that revenue integrity is the most important component of the financial health of their organizations.

The report by Atlanta-based revenue cycle software provider Craneware Inc. polled 57 hospital executives, of whom 34 were C-suite level employees. About a third were affiliated with large hospitals and healthcare systems with the remainder split between critical access, community and medium-sized facilities.

More than 90 percent of the respondents said the current financial environment is more challenging or far more challenging than it was four years ago. Among the most important financial priorities was receiving proper reimbursement from private payers, the complexity of reimbursement policies from government payers and ensuring optimal reimbursements for pharmaceuticals and medical supplies.

In response, more than half of hospitals executives say they have added additional staff to address revenue integrity issues, while one-quarter went so far as to establish separate revenue integrity departments.

One system to take the revenue integrity plunge was the Intermountain Health Care System, the dominant hospital operator in Utah.

"Creating a multidisciplinary revenue integrity team was vital to building a strong, collaborative partnership between our clinical and financial staff," said Todd Craghead, Intermountain's vice president of revenue cycle, in a statement.

For more:
- read the Craneware survey results (.pdf)
- read the Craneware press release