In a bid to consolidate its revenue cycle management portfolio, health IT company Cerner announced today a new patient accounting product that will marry the strengths of its existing Millennium and Soarian offerings.
Cerner said that it will begin phasing in the new product, called Cerner RevElate Patient Accounting, among the majority of its existing healthcare customers beginning in 2023.
Those customers will be seeing a “like-for-like” replacement of their Millennium and Soarian platforms, meaning no new license fees and no additional investment in professional service fees to accommodate the uplift, according to Brenna Quinn, Cerner’s SVP of enterprise market solutions.
“RevElate is the culmination of a multiyear journey that brings the leverage of the two platforms, but enhances them with additional capabilities and converges them so we have a single go-forward patient accounting offering that is clinically driven,” she said. “[RevElate] brings forward the proven cross-venue patient accounting workflows that exist on the Soarian platform but on an extension of an open platform, as well as advancement of data models, master files, first-class integration of data and a common workflow and user experience.”
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For Quinn, the standout new features coming to the consolidated platform are open API support and workflow automation.
The former will allow provider clients to build out their revenue cycle system with third-party add-ons, both from established Cerner partners and other entities developing compatible tools.
The latter will drive more efficient day-to-day management of patient accounting workflows, she said.
“Essentially, we can bring forward the benefits of the type of outcomes you want to see in the back office—fewer manual touches with more automated tasks—but leveraging the power of upfront management of the revenue cycle right from the point of registration, through the coding process all the way through the backend,” she said.
Quinn noted the platform overhaul will be particularly valuable for large-scale enterprise clients and multi-entities looking to extend a single platform across different settings. Should an organization acquire new facilities, Cerner is now able to support the management of accounts receivable under the existing IT platform as they transition onto RevElate, she said.
Cerner said in its announcement that BayCare Health System, Charleston Area Medical Center and CoxHealth have each signed on as early adopters of the new platform.
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BayCare Health System, which already runs both Millennium and Soarian, will also be serving as the health IT company’s validation partner. Quinn said that the partners are expecting to complete validation of the base version of RevElate by mid-2022, after which all of its new revenue cycle starts will be handled through RevElate.
“Efficiently managing our enterprise revenue cycle process is paramount to the vitality of our organization. To put it simply, BayCare succeeds when we deliver a quality patient experience at every step, from intake to final billing,” Lynda Gorken, vice president of patient financial services at BayCare Health System, said in a statement. “As a longtime client of Cerner's, we are excited to bring the expected benefits of Cerner RevElate Patient Accounting to our patients and staff.”
Quinn said that Cerner will begin uplifting other Millennium and Soarian users to the new platform in 2023. This crossover process will expand multiple years, allowing customers to make the jump “when it makes sense for them,” she said.
Cerner recently reversed four back-to-back quarters of financial decline, reporting a 10% jump in revenue to nearly $1.5 billion during its most recent earnings call. At the same time, the company’s net income dropped 75% year-over-year due largely to restructuring costs.
Internally, this week saw David Feinberg, M.D., record his first days as the health IT company’s new president and CEO.
Cerner also informed staff that it will be requiring full COVID-19 vaccination for all U.S.-based associates by Dec. 8, a spokesperson confirmed.