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 How Much Are Your Unsigned Orders Worth?
By Ron Barrera, Director, Financial Consulting, Simione Consultants
How much money do you have sitting in your office waiting to be put in the bank? Do you track unsigned orders? What is reasonable? We talk a lot about billing benchmarks and tracking DSOs and how old claims are. One simple benchmark not often mentioned is tracking how many unsigned orders there are and the dollar amount they represent. That is money that you have no access to until you get the claim filed. One way to determine this is to have your billing department give you the total number of claims not billed due to unsigned orders and the dollar amount of those claims. Once you have this number, you can determine if this is reasonable or not. To determine the reasonableness, look at how many admissions you have per month, then determine the average time it takes to get orders prepared, sent out, and back signed. Is this number greater than your internal policy states or time requirements mandated by state licensure? Use this number to show whether or not you are above or behind the benchmark you have established. Assign the task of follow up on unsigned orders to someone who has the ability to follow through with physicians. Shy away from using your sales staff to get orders signed as this takes them away from their focus of getting new business. For more information about our Financial Consulting Services, click here or contact Ron Barrera at rbarrera@simione.com |
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COST REPORT "TIP"
Does your agency contract with outside vendors for therapy services?
By Brian Martin, Consultant, Simione Consultants
If so, are you maintaining separate general ledger accounts for these services by discipline? Don't wait until the end of the year to sort out the costs by discipline for the cost report. If your vendor provides you with multiple types of services, ask them to provide you with a summary of how many visits they performed for each discipline. You should also match the invoices to the billing records to insure that all the visits are being billed. Doing this will keep you aware of any billing abnormalities and give you an idea as to the cost per visit for contracts and whether it may be time to look for a new vendor or not.
To view our cost report presentation on the Home Health Cost Report, click here
For more information about our Cost Report Consulting Services, click here or contact Brian Martin at bmartin@simione.com.
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 CLINICAL "TIP"
Revisiting The April 1, 2011 Therapy Changes
By Becky Smarr, PT, COS-C, Senior Manager, Simione Consultants
Differences between the 13th/19th visit and the 30-day functional reassessment requirements can be confusing!
30-day requirement:
- Reassessments must occur at least every 30 days.
- 30-day clock starts for each therapy discipline on their initial evaluation and resets with any subsequent reassessment (including 13/19). Counting of days continues for the entire duration of therapy without regard for the end of the certification period.
13/19 requirement:
- Single therapy discipline: reassessment must occur on precisely the 13th and 19th visits unless the patient resides in a rural area or circumstances "outside the control of the therapist" prevent the therapist from visiting on visits 13/19. In these specific exceptions, the therapist may reassess on visits 10, 11, 12, or 13 but NO LATER THAN 13, and on visit 16, 17, 18, or 19 but NO LATER THAN 19.
- Multi-therapy disciplines: reassessments by EACH DISCIPLINE are required CLOSE TO BUT NO LATER THAN the 13th and 19th cumulative (PT + OT + SLP) therapy visits.
- Counting of therapy visits resets ONLY at the end of the 60-day payment episode.
Simione's therapy experts can guide you through the maze of therapy reassessment scheduling and documentation.
For more information about our Clinical Consulting Services, click here or contact Becky Smarrat bsmarr@simione.com.
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 MARKETING, SALES & CUSTOMER SERVICE "TIP"
By Mike Ferris, Principal, Simione Consultants
In past issues I have talked about what the Simione Referral Management System (SRMS) is, and how effectively it can benefit agencies. After having implemented our Simione Referral Management System in agencies across the country, we've taken the data we collected and best practices we implemented and wrote our findings in a Special Report that will go on sale soon. As readers of Simione Solutions, you have the opportunity to obtain this Special Report, "How to Use Mystery Calls to Improve Your Referral Management System and Increase Admissions", before anyone else, and as a way of saying thank you, we are offering it to you with our compliments. If you are interested in being among the first to get the report, email tferris@simione.com.
Don't Miss Our Upcoming Square One Bootcamps
Chapel Hill, NC · August 29 - 31st, 2011 & October 24 - 26th , 2011
For more information about our Marketing, Sales and Customer Service Consulting Services, click here or contact Mike Ferris at mferris@simione.com
Receive complimentary subscription to the bi-weekly eNewsletter, "The Legendary Sales Leadership Letter" to make sure you don't miss a single tip or strategy to increase referrals without increasing costs click here
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Visit us next week at the
NAHC Financial Managers Conference
in San Diego, CA July 13-15,
Booth 304 to learn more about the
solutions we can provide your agency!
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