18-3Thinking It Through Ellie Myers has been entering patient billing data into
ID: 127091 • Letter: 1
Question
18-3Thinking It Through
Ellie Myers has been entering patient billing data into the computer as part of her work as the administrative assistant and bookkeeper at Chandler Sports Medicine Clinic. The last week has been difficult for Ellie, because she has out-of-town relatives staying at her house and she is dealing with a variety of family problems. She is usually able to concentrate on her work but has been so tired the last few days that it has been difficult for her to fully focus on the details of data entry.
What might be the consequences if Ellie makes the following types of errors?
Enters the wrong medical procedure codes on a bill to an insurance company
Sends an appointment letter to the wrong patient
Directs laboratory test requests to the wrong lab
Enters the wrong numbers for expenses in the computerized accounting program
What would you recommend that Ellie do to protect against making mistakes of this kind?
Explanation / Answer
To avoid common medical billing: stay vigilant about simple mistakes on your end, be thorough when reviewing a patient’s superbill, and consult with your physician whenever you have questions about what should or shouldn’t be billed for. Most medical billing errors can be avoided well before claims are sent for processing with an insurance company, and it’s up to you to keep the claims moving through the system quickly and accurately.
Sending an appointment letter to the wrong patient can be rectified by doing recall of letter.Call to the patient directly and let them know that it is not for them and should be given the right one.Care should be taken by the staff not to repeat this and be alert.
Patient confidentiality is the main criteria to be followed by any helathcare organisation,if any breach in patinet privacy is suspected it comes under the legislations of HIPAA privacy rule.One must be very cautious as they are dealing with patient samples ,should be sent to the correct lab they prefer.Sending it to wrong lab might also results in missing of samples and results in brach of patient privacy,as it should be confidential and saved in their own databases or the lab they are referring to.Corrective action should be taken immediately by informing the lab they have sent as misplace of samples might take place and document the incident happened so that there are less chances to happen in future.
Each person who enters information in a medical chart must make sure the notations are mistake-free, complete and tell a story. Any missing, or excessive, detail can affect charges on a final bill and determine how much is covered by insurance.Then there are people at insurance companies who decide if your treatment is covered, hospital billing employees who review charges and, in many cases, collections workers whose job is to make sure that patients should pay. so wrong entry in number might affect the insurance of the person,and if it less entry it may affect the hospitals revenue too.
Ellie should take care and should be in presence of mind as shes dealing with the patients bills directly or indirectly. Few precautions to be followed:Coordinate with everyone at the provider’s office,Double-check patient and insurance information before filing a claim,Study billing and coding trends,Follow up on claims. Set prices, descriptions and taxable or nontaxable status for items so they appear when you enter the item on an invoice. Keep the list up to date. Store details for customers and patients as well.Make a detailed paln to set everything and vary according to their description so that it might automatically appear without any confusion.
Related Questions
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.