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SAVE THE DATE!
Fall Meeting ~ October 18-19, 2013 ~ Embassy Suites - Kansas City Plaza, Kansas City, MO
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Time to renew your Membership for 2013!
If you have not done so already, click here to renew .
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Midwest AAOE Launches Webinar Series
The Midwest AAOE was delighted to launch our new member benefit and partnership with Cretcher Heartland earlier this month. A recording of our first webinar is provided below. Each quarter the Midwest AAOE will host a free webinar for members of the association. Cretcher Heartland has agreed to assist us with speakers and content for many of these sessions. The sessions will be recorded and available for playback for Midwest AAOE Members. Our first webinar took place on July 12th: Navigating the Maze of the Patient Protection & Affordable Care Act
Presented by:
Kelly Miller
Vice President of Employee Benefits
Cretcher Heartland
With countless sources of information flooding your inbox and news feed, it is an understatement to say it is "challenging" to keep up with Healthcare Reform. Critical deadlines and complex implementation requirements are scheduled for 2013 and 2014, some having already passed. Do you understand how healthcare reform will impact your company? Cretcher Heartland's Employee Benefits experts remain at the forefront of helping employers understand the complex compliance, financial, and strategic issues. By combining an overview of current and future legislative changes, combined with practical application, we will address the important issues directly affecting employers.
If you were unable to take part in the webinar, please click on the following link to download the recording:
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Despite challenges, majority of physician practice owners look to hold on.
Although many physicians who own their practices say they are struggling to keep their operations afloat, more than 60 percent say they would not consider selling, according to a survey of more than 5,000 owner-practitioners. Cardiologists were among the most pessimistic about their financial future, with 49 percent saying their financial trend will be "somewhat" or "very" negative in the next year; the report in the American Medical Association's amednews.com did not break out results for orthopaedic surgeons. Of the practice-owning physicians surveyed, 36 percent predicted negative profitability trend during the next year, compared with 22 percent who said returns would be positive and 30 percent who said they would stay the same. Among the cardiologists, 44 percent of those who own their own practices said they have no interest in selling even though there may seem to be a clear financial motivation to do so. The top issues troubling the owner-physicians were declining payments and government-mandated changes (eg, the ACA, ICD-10 conversion, and adoption of electronic health record systems). The survey was conducted by QuantiaMD, an online physician community, and CareCloud, a cloud-based health IT vendor. In a separate survey, MedAxiom, a cardiology-specific community of health care administrators and physician leaders, found that independent cardiologists earn an average of 26 percent less than those in integrated practices.
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Government data finds 17 percent falloff in EHR meaningful use.
 A blog posting at EMR Straight Talk points out that, based on Medicare and Medicaid Electronic Health Records (EHR) Incentive Programs attestation data, 17 percent of providers who earned an $18,000 EHR incentive in 2011 did not earn the $12,000 second incentive in 2012. In addition, a second survey cited by the author finds that 13.6 percent of respondents stated that they do not plan to attest for the Stage 2 rules for meaningful use. The author suggests that the complicated nature of some EHR systems is at least one factor in the falloff.
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OIG conducting audits to identify potential EHR upcoding.
According to Modern Healthcare, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of the Inspector General (OIG) is conducting targeted audits of hospitals to find possible upcoding of medical services related to use of electronic health records (EHRs). Reports that payments surged to some hospitals as they implemented EHRs have raised concerns that those institutions may have padded Medicare bills by using the detailed coding ability of EHRs. In response, CMS stated in March that the agency planned to undertake targeted audits focused on EHR-related upcoding, and this week, an HHS official speaking on condition of anonymity said the targeted audits will continue and that CMS is considering other steps to identify possible upcoders.
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