In an article published last week by Cristy Good at MGMA, Ms Good had written, “half of the practices are experiencing a significant increase in the number of days of A/R in 2021.”
The most recent MGMA stats poll indicated that 50% of medical practice leaders said their days in A/R increased in 2021, compared to 15% who reported a decrease, and 37% who said they remained the same. (MGMA conducted the poll on November 9th, 2021, and received 587 responses.)Practices know that the longer a medical bill goes unpaid, the more difficult it becomes to collect. According to a report by Forbes and Debt.com, half of Americans are in some kind of debt for medical expenses (57% owe at least $1,000)
The receivables are grouped into “aging buckets” of 0 to 30 days, 31 to 60 days, 61 to 90 days, 91 to 120 days, and 121+ days. MGMA DataDive Cost and Revenue estimates that the median amount of A/R over 120 days in multi-specialty practices is 13.54%.
According to the survey, practices identified several key factors that contributed to the increase in A/R days:
- Limited office staff to handle outstanding debts
- Training of new employees can be arduous
- In an Aug. 24 MGMA Stat survey, 54% of medical practices reported credentialing-related denials increased in 2021 as a result of questionable denials and delays.
What Needs To Be Prioritized
- Establish billing guidelines and a process for collecting unpaid balances
- Establish systems for collecting past-due balances
- Communicating with the patient is extremely important (especially if they need assistance in understanding the portion of the bill they are responsible for or their deductible)
- Providing payment options helps reduce bad debts and prevents them from being referred to collections
- Regularly run A/R reports and deal with denials immediately
- Coding is essential to every aspect of RCM
- The staff should be coding experts, and they should educate the providers whenever possible
- All encounters should be closed on the same day (not more than 72 hours after a visit)
