The world is evolving at a rapid pace, and healthcare is no exception. Patients are more connected to their health than ever before, putting the power of care into their own hands. This shift necessitates new standards for the patient experience, including pricing that’s transparent, readily available and easy to understand.
With the introduction of the No Surprises Act, healthcare providers are required to meet these new patient experience standards in a palpable, regulated way.
But improving this experience is just one of many challenges healthcare providers are juggling in 2022. Reducing A/R balances, the cost to collect and meeting 501 regulatory requirements are also hurdles.
Luckily, new tools in the healthcare space can help ease the burden and provide transparency. Patient financial clearance assists providers in finding the best financial path for patients. Financial flexibility and patient payment estimator solutions make healthcare bill payments convenient for providers and patients alike.
“We’ve been on a revenue cycle journey to modernization,” said Becky Peters, Executive Director of Patient Access for Banner Health, who recently implemented Financial Clearance workflows with Cerner, “The biggest reason we embarked on this journey was to improve the patient financial experience, physician satisfaction, preparation for new EHR, and to provide significant revenue lift and ROI to pay for the modernization tools and workflows that we were implementing.”
Patient financial clearance
The patient access tools provided by Cerner Patient Financial Clearance workflows can be vital to improving the patient experience and reducing pricing-related confusion. According to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) an average American patient has at least 12.2 percent of their medical bill still unpaid after insurance coverage. By verifying identities and any potential red flags, these solutions make sure patients and providers are on the same page when it comes to billing. Typically, the process involves:
- Address verification and identification of red flags related to social security numbers
- Medicaid/charity and other financial assistance program qualification likelihood for each patient
- Automation of the enrollment processes for eligible patients
- And data driven assessment of a patient’s likelihood to pay medical bills
- Optimal payment amount in an established payment plan
Financial Clearance improves the patient experience, providing easy-to-understand cost breakdowns via a secure, mobile experience. This is the kind of control and convenience the modern healthcare experience is shifting toward, making the process as easy as possible for provider and patient alike.
Patients should be able to know what they’re looking at when it comes to medical payments. Patient financial clearance workflows allow healthcare providers to provide patients with a clear understanding of payment expectations and options, improving their experience in what can be stressful situations.