To achieve effective nurse staffing, you need CFO-CNO alignment
To respond effectively to ongoing disruptions in the nursing workforce, which have been exacerbated by COVID-19, health system finance and nursing leaders need to come together to find a new financial, clinical and operational approach to improving performance.
Why health systems may find an acute care at home strategy attractive
The potential for improved outcomes is just one important reason to consider pursuing an acute care at home strategy. Even in the absence of payment, health systems may ultimately find pursuit of such a strategy beneficial.
Strategic alternative dispute resolution offers providers key to substantial claim recoveries
To be able to effectively handle disputes over healthcare claims, providers must be well-informed about the two basic types of alternative dispute resolution that can help them achieve favorable results: arbitration and mediation.
3 ways the patient financial experience can improve health equity
COVID-19 shined a bright light on disparities in access to care and health outcomes that existed in the U.S. healthcare system long before the pandemic, but far from improving the situation, it has exacerbated those disparities. Now, health system revenue cycle departments have an opportunity to be part of the solution.
5 ways the ERM playbook for health systems is due for a rewrite
Business risk for health systems has continued to evolve amid huge changes affecting the industry, including those driven by COVID-19. Health system leaders should respond by revisiting their approach to enterprise risk management (ERM) to focus on five areas of risk where their ability to deliver healthcare cost effectively could be compromised: Labor shortages, capital planning amid ongoing change, energy consumption, cyber security and price transparency.
How LifePoint Health revamped its revenue cycle
Executives for the non-urban focused health system wanted to get all of its hospitals using a single revenue cycle management approach.
6 ways to ease physicians’ burden from coding, documentation and risk adjustment
The COVID-19 pandemic has heightened the need for U.S. health systems to gain physician cooperation in documenting and coding patient risk. Yet these organizations also should be mindful of the administrative burden many physicians feel from having to perform these processes, which has contributed to feelings of burnout among them. This article describes six steps hospitals and health systems can take to help ease the administrative burden for physicians, which is necessary to ensure the future quality and effectiveness of the nation’s healthcare system.
8 ways healthcare providers can smooth the DRG audit process
A health system’s financial sustainability depends on its being paid appropriately for the services it delivers. Yet routine payer audits can all too often result in downgrades of a health system’s billed diagnosis-related groups (DRGs), resulting in lower payment. It therefore behooves health systems to be well prepared for such audits and thoroughly understand why payers’ are most inclined to take such action.
A checklist for successful hospital cost reporting in the time of COVID-19
COVID-19 will have long-term impacts on the operations of hospitals, and on their costs in particular., making it imperative that hospitals be mindful of how those impacts extend to their cost report data.
Healthcare providers face a growing risk of violating debt covenants
COVID-19 has increased the financial strain on healthcare providers that puts them at risk of being noncompliant with lending covenants. They should be taking proactive steps now to avoid or mitigate the potentially severe adverse financial consequence of such an occurrence.