Thinking of starting your own practice?

With over 70% of hospital employees getting out and getting back into private practice whether they have done it before or doing it for the first time this article has the top 5 things we recommend our providers do before starting out on their own.  They don’t teach you this in med school!

http://www.kareo.com/gettingpaid/2014/09/the-5-first-steps-to-start-a-new-medicalpractice/

Now of course we recommend outsourcing as many activities as you can, and we can help you with cost effective solutions and personal service that a national company can’t compete with.  Please consider us as a source to help you in improving your reimbursement and gaining efficiencies in your office!

ICD 10 Delayed – Again

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services posted in August 2014 that the road to ICD-10 compliance will be another year longer.  The new date for conversion is 10/1/2015.  As we’ve published before, this conversion is long over due and WILL be coming at some point even if they keep pushing back the date.

This conversion was not a part of the Affordable Care Act, so if you are thinking that if the ACA goes away so will this conversion and that is just simply “head in the sand” thinking.  This is an implementation of a international coding standard and we here in the US are just behind the curve with the rest of the western world in using this new classification system.  We do need to catch up and we eventually will.  Don’t let this conversion scare you out of your practice!  I have had a lot of providers tell me that they will quit first before converting, and that just isn’t practical.  ICD-10 will benefit the medical community by increasing the accuracy of diagnosis coding and allow entitlement programs and insurance carriers to gain more specificity in tracking diagnosis populations.  With more specificity comes more attention which leads to more reimbursement for the provider.

If you are a small practice, I urge you to check out the CMS website for the “Road to 10” implementation map

Road to 10: CMS Online Tool for Small Practices

CMS has released Road to 10, an online resource built with the help of providers in small practices, is now available. This tool is intended to help small medical practices jumpstart their ICD-10 transition.

“Road to 10” includes specialty references and gives providers the capability to build ICD-10 action plans tailored for their practice needs.

Also, VE Cycle Management specializes in providing solutions that are already ICD-10 ready.  We can help!  Contact us today!

ICD-10 Delay

So on 3/31/14 both the house and senate voted on a “Dr. Fix” bill that included language for another one year delay on the ICD-10 implementation.  CMS has been saying for more than a year that there will be no more delays…period… Then what does the congress do? Overrule them.  Many healthcare organizations are speaking out that the delay portion of the bill did not have to be included. That congress has once again cost us billions of dollars by not listening to their constituency or the experts when it comes to throwing in additional pieces of legislature just to pad the bill.  Here is what the American Healthcare Information Management Association had to say: http://journal.ahima.org/2014/03/31/senate-votes-on-icd-10-delay-bill/

While most experts agree it was a stupid move to include the delay in the bill, now providers are wondering what they are supposed to do.  Check out this link: http://www.fiercehealthit.com/story/icd-10-delay-how-providers-should-respond/2014-04-02

As far as VE Cycle Management is concerned we are going to continue to prepare our clients for ICD-10 as part of what we do for them daily.  Providers now have some extra time to train, map and migrate and may think that the road to full implementation will be slowed again.  The point is and the point that my company will emphasize is “don’t put off tomorrow what you can do today!” 

ICD-10 is still coming, we are the only western nation still on ICD-9, most of Europe is on ICD-11 so it’s just a matter of time and you have to make sure your staff, technology, and you are ready for it.  Ask us, we’ll help!

So.. Hey, we are looking for funding!

Well, we have made a lot of contacts since Tracy and I really hit the pavement to keep doctors in private practice from being taken over by hospital and insurance conglomerates.  It’s been a rocky road; the recent government shutdown kept the hubby at home and within the last few weeks another contract I’d had has reduced my hours, so I decided that I believe so much in what we are doing, I am not too proud to beg….

As a result, here is our campaign on Indiegogo http://igg.me/at/vecycle/x/1859127 and our campaign on gofundme.com http://www.gofundme.com/vecycle

Our perks are pretty good if I do say so myself!  Go get yourself a T-Shirt or an iPad Mini!!

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