What Added Services Can Add Medical Practice Revenue?

In today’s healthcare environment we have been blessed with the development and implementation of integrated practice management, electronic medical records, and reporting systems. Gone are the days of appointment books, peg board, paper charts, balancing your daily and monthly collections with a calculator and sending out paper patient statements.

Many practices have seen the transition in to a highly technical environment that allows them to manage and collect information and data at the press of a button. There has also been a shift away from fee-for-service towards pay-for-performance.

Medicare and commercial health plans are now requiring that providers meet certain standards and provide wellness and other services. This has created some opportunities to increase medical practice revenue. But if you don’t follow through, you may see a decrease instead.

Some payers will be penalizing providers financially by reducing reimbursement from three to nine percent. On the other hand, I have medical practice clients that are already receiving bonus checks in addition to higher reimbursement for meeting certain requirements.

There are ways to use this paid-on-performance environment to increase revenue without the cost and assistance of outside marketing expenses by developing and implementing simple and cost effective revenue generating programs within your practice.

You can generate additional revenue, meet HEDIS and Meaningful Use requirements, and increase patient satisfaction by implementing screening programs such as: 

• Diabetic Retinopthy
• Skin Cancer Screening
• Drug Testing
• Pharmacogenetic Testing
• Medical Weight Loss
• Allergy Testing
• Smoking cessation
  

These programs can be targeted to existing patients, making them very cost effective. With the right staff education, support, compensation, and work flows you can successfully implement any of these new revenue streams to help ensure your long term success.