Getting hurt and going to the hospital can be a traumatic and horrible experience. Everyone knows this. The real problem is that sometimes the trouble doesn’t stop there.
When you get out of the hospital, you need to take care of the bureaucracy. Hospitals are expensive and if you have no insurance it might cost you tens of thousands of dollars.
If your insurance is ready to cover the bill, then you’ll have fewer problems. However, this is not so simple too. You need to handle all the issues and make great communication between the two factors – the doctors and the insurers. You’re in the middle which means both parties will see you responsible for certain things.
To avoid this, you can always hire a billing company to mediate and take care of the process. If you want to learn more about this, read this article and see what all is about.
What is billing
The actual service you got at the hospital, also called health care, must be paid. This money can come out of your pocket or from the insurance company. Learn more about how insurers work here.
Transferring the obligations for the services of the clinic to the insurers is called billing. Still, it’s not that simple as it looks. The hospital staff probably made a lot of procedures that need to be paid, but who can understand what all these procedures were and how much they’re worth.
How the procedure goes
Once you’re ready to do this, you need to turn the diagnoses and procedures into bills. This is called coding. Coding is transferring words into money. The professional medical coders read the documentation that doctors left after your treatment and see what they spent money on.
Then, they make a clear estimate of what costs more and what costs less. If you’re doing this by yourself, be sure that you’ll have to have understandings of medicine, medical costs and everything that goes with it.
Trying to do it on your own is impossible
With everything said above, you realize that it’s nearly impossible to do it on your own unless you have previous experience in working on this matter. Talking about it, how many people you know that understand how medical billing and coding works? None, right? Chance are slim to none that you’re one of them and that’s why you need a different solution.
The best option is to hire someone else to do it for you. There are professional companies with lots of employees handling such problems. They work on these topics every day and understand all the details. If you know nothing about this procedure it’s best if you give them the obligation. This way you can be sure that you won’t lose a ton of money. See this great infographic to learn about how coders work: https://static.aapc.com/aapc/images/infographic-day-in-the-life-of-medical-coder.png
Hiring a billing services company and what they do
Among the many other issues they’re handling, the billing companies work for clients who were previously patients. They manage to follow through the billing procedure without any problem.
When a person hires this kind of company, they make sure the income stays in their pocket. Not being able to do the procedure completely and thoroughly will mean losing money, time, and additional health. It is estimated that clients hiring these kinds of professionals save up to 20% of the money that others usually spend on bills.
So how the whole procedure goes? The first thing that needs to be done is coding. Professional coders get deep and down into the documents coming from the hospital. They see every detail and make a clear estimate of how much was spend.
Then, this amount is transferred to the billers who send the amount to the insurance company. These people make sure the whole procedure goes smoothly and fast enough. When the insurers release the money, they make sure everything is covered. In the end, they follow up the denials and your job as a client is to sit back and relax.
There are lots of firms doing this around the USA. Every state has a different number and they all have their pros and cons. You can read about this on some of the review sites online to make sure you’re choosing the right one. If you’re in PA, try AccuMed BS as a great example.
Conclusion
As you can see, this is not an easy procedure. You need to be completely involved in this if you want to make a good job. Everyone that tried to do this on their own failed and only lost a lot of money.
The best choice you can do in this situation is to look for the pros. They handle situations like this daily and know about all the details of the business. If you want to have a peaceful mind and feel relaxed after your stay at the hospital, this is the best and the only choice.
