Published data quantify how cost increases will continue to affect the healthcare industry next year
The cost to treat patients will accelerate next year, with ramifications across the healthcare industry, according to newly published projections. PwC’s Health Research Institute reported that the cost of providing care will increase by 7% in 2024, up from a 6% increase this year and 5.5% in 2022. A 7% increase would tie 2021 for…
Stemming the outpatient profit squeeze with a revenue cycle workflow gap analysis
Hospital and health system outpatient, outreach and ancillary services are often confined to EHR systems to manage their billing. Designed for bigger-ticket, lower-volume claims, these systems lack specific front-end intelligence, system connectivity, and automation necessary to efficiently manage these departments’ unique billing need. Too often, the result is an unnecessarily high number of submission errors,…
Summary: 10 vital responses to healthcare disruption
Note: This article is a summary of a report on HFMA’s Spring Thought Leadership Retreat. The full report is available to download. Disruption is reverberating throughout the healthcare industry, and it’s incumbent on legacy organizations to develop strategic responses for the benefit of their consumers, their communities and themselves. With that overarching challenge becoming ever…
Patient access: The key to a healthy revenue cycle
As hospitals and physician groups face ongoing labor shortages and skyrocketing costs, maintaining effective Patient Access processes is critical. Ensuring efficiency and accuracy upstream helps prevent delayed reimbursement downstream—while supporting a positive patient experience. Download this whitepaper to explore the three patient access processes that can help protect revenue and improve the patient experience. Identify…
Prices of drugs for diabetes, heart failure and more will be up for negotiation in Medicare next year
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on Tuesday announced the first 10 Medicare Part D drugs that will be subject to price negotiations, the headlining healthcare-related provision of the Inflation Reduction Act. Signed in August 2022, the law gave Medicare authority to negotiate with drug manufacturers over the prices of selected drugs.…
Data indicate hospital operational logjams haven’t ceased after the public health emergency (updated)
Note: The fourth section of this article has been updated with news of proposed mandatory staffing ratios for long-term care facilities. Some of the problems that strained hospital operations during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic have eased, but not enough to mark a true industrywide recovery, a recently released report suggests. Notably, the process…
Children’s hospitals swim against the tide to improve the health of their patients and communities
As the nation’s pediatric hospitals strive to keep kids healthy, they face obstacles that reflect the difficulty of enacting structural changes in care delivery. Even pediatric hospitals that are eager to engage in value-based payment (VBP) models can have a hard time establishing the type of network that allows them to affect the holistic health…
5 ways end-to-end RCM improves the employee experience
In today’s healthcare landscape, it can be very difficult to find and retain top talent. The key? Improve the employee experience. See the 5 ways end-to-end RCM can enhance your team’s day-to-day, creating a superior work environment that speaks for itself. Inside this guide, you’ll learn how to improve the employee experience by enabling more…
Cyberattack leaves hospitals scrambling in several states
A recent attack was the latest to illustrate the potential of cybercriminals to cause havoc across an interstate health system. The Los Angeles-based Prospect Medical Holdings system incurred a ransomware attack Aug. 3 that temporarily required some patients to be diverted from emergency departments and relegated hospitals to using paper records and incorporating other downtime…
How to staff smarter and reduce reliance on expensive travel contracts
To bridge the healthcare staffing gap and tackle workforce issues such as burnout, spikes in labor costs, and rising retirements among nurses, hospitals and healthcare facilities need a technology-driven approach that empowers staffing managers with the control needed to address fluctuating patient volume without understaffing or overspending on labor. This How-To guide highlights the challenges,…