Medical Coding Outsourcing Services
Healthcare centers and clinics are related to medical coding outsourcing to keep away from general problems such as Up-coding and Down-coding and problems that frequently result in claim rejection. Healthcare centers and clinics that currently take care of medical coding in-house are also trying to switch to medical coding outsourcing considering its benefits.
When it comes to medical coding, a medical organization can have to struggle to keep up with the regularly changing rules and regulation and if the organization have lack of resources to handle medical coding requirements. If so, consider about the medical coding outsourcing service is the best option for keep success of the medical organization.
In this article I’m going to talk about what is medical coding outsourcing, what are the benefits of medical coding outsourcing, which services can have through medical coding outsourcing, and so on.
What is medical coding outsourcing?
Medical coding Outsourcing means you contract with a third-party coding company to do your medical coding work, instead of completing medical coding in-house. Most probably, the medical coding outsourcing company will be responsible for most of the work related to the medical coding of a practice.
A medical coding outsourcing company has well-trained coders who have updated skills in medical coding. While many medical coders work online, a medical practice can also contract with coders who will come into the practice and work there.
The other way to do medical coding is in-house medical coding. In some practices, medical professionals and physicians do their patient’s coding by themselves. Some organizations have an in-house medical coding team to do their medical coding.
Especially when considering the ICD-10 coding, it takes more time for those coding processes. It is also a good point to consider about medical coding outsourcing service.
Medical coding outsourcing companies consider all the pathways of the medical coding process. They have qualified work staff for coding and also always they take the responsibility for providing the best service of medical coding.
Medical coding outsourcing services have become profitable and demanded industry around the world. A business can have a lot of advantages by choosing medical coding outsourcing.
It’s a practical and wise solution that works with medical coding outsourcing services when a medical practice hasn’t any good and professional coders.
How does medical coding outsourcing works?
When a medical practice decides to hand over their coding works for a medical coding outsourcing company, a physician will send medical coding details for the medical coding outsourcing company.
Then the medical coding outsourcing company studies the coding details and completes the tasks and hands over them back to the medical practice.
Always medical coding outsourcing companies review and audit the medical charts completed by their coders. By reviewing them they make sure the accuracy and compliance of medical charts before they are sent on to the hospital or practice.
Medical coding outsourcing companies not only do reviews and audits of medical details but also provide services like clinical document improvements and research support.
Benefits of Outsourcing Medical Coding
A medical practice can have a lot of benefits by having the service of medical coding outsourcing. When considering these benefits, a medical coding outsourcing service is the best option for medical coding in medical practices.
1. UpDate Certifications
Medical coders should always have to keep up with updates from government organizations, healthcare practices, and other groups. It’s a very important factor.
However, If you work with a medical coding outsourcing company, you don’t have to think about the above requirements. Medical coding outsourcing companies will take care of these things and they will keep updated to working on medical charts with their certifications, skills, and knowledge.
2.Flexibility and Scalability
A medical coding outsourcing company offers a more flexible and scalable service rather than an in-house medical coding team offers. A medical practice can have a limited no of coders by in-house medical coding.
Because of connecting with a medical coding outsourcing company, a medical practice can deal with a huge number of coding experts. This makes your work easy. If the medical practice has more workload than expected it won’t be a problem because medical coding outsourcing companies can assign more members of staff to complete that workload.
Because of medical coding outsourcing, a medical practice also has access to coders with different expertise and certifications. By hiring a medical coding outsourcing company, a medical practice can have coding for unfamiliar paths of medical services because medical coding outsourcing companies have expert staff.
3.Cost-Effectiveness
A lot of times work a medical coding outsourcing company will be more cost-effective than hiring and maintaining an in-house medical coding team. Employing medical coders, especially ones who have expert knowledge skills and work experience can be more expensive. With medical coding outsourcing, you can have the service of expert coders at a low-level cost.
Generally, a lot of organizations have to pay more cost for office supplies and working space for staff members and also for training and supervising employees, hiring, insurance, and licensing processes. If you have your medical coding team, you have to consider more costs.
By giving the coding process for a medical coding outsourcing company you won’t have to worry about such costs. Because outsourcing medical coding companies have a better experience with medical coding and it is their main subject, they can offer medical coding services for an affordable price. Surely that cost me less than the in-house medical coding.
Cost-effectiveness may be different from practice to practice you can think about which one is better. But nowadays most common approach is getting service from medical coding outsourcing companies.
4.Transparency
From time to time you have to take care of the operation of your practice. It helps you to have a good idea about your practice by identifying weak processes and which processes should be increased. You can have these details without invest extra staff, time or money by having the service of the medical coding outsourcing company.
The medical coding outsourcing company will provide all the detailed information and performance reports according to your medical coding and billing. You can have those details from a Medical coding outsourcing company by requesting or automatically.
So, transparency is another benefit of having the service from a medical coding outsourcing company.
5.Security and Compliance
Security and compliance with regulation is another main concern for all healthcare organizations. When it comes to medical coding and billing, it is an important factor that data security and data recovery methods protect from data losses and cyber-attacks.
And also some regulations have to concern about when creating medical coding and billing details.
The medical coding outsourcing company has a well-known understanding of the security and compliance of data. Medical practice can focus on their main duties rather than concerns about data security while medical coding outsourcing companies will take care of it.
6.More Time for Core Activities
By working with an in-house medical coding company, a medical practice have to spend more time, resources, and money for their medical coding process especially when the medical coding is done by their physician.
By giving medical coding to a medical coding outsourcing company, a medical practice can focus more on its activities. The staff of the medical practice can focus more on patients because of this.
A responsible medical coding outsourcing company will provide coding information on time with an accurate way to medical practice.
7.Consistent Staffing Levels
If a medical practice has their own in-house medical coding team, the team have to do all the coding tasks no matter how much the workload is. Sometimes a medical practice has more workload on medical coding rather than expected. Maybe you will fail to complete the workload within the correct schedule because of the lack of staff members for medical coding.
A medical practice won’t face such problems if they work with a medical coding outsourcing company. A medical coding outsourcing company has a large number of staff members and they can work without any time delay.
Here I mention qualities that a coder should have of medical coding outsourcing team.
- The latest knowledge about CPT, ICD-9, ICD-10and HCPCS codes across various specialties.
- Relevant skills to identify specific codes needed for the current payer.
- Insurance and governmental regulatory requirements are needed.
- Have experience in multiple specialties such as Anesthesiology, Cardiology, Physical Therapy, Chiropractic, Radiology, Critical Care, Dermatology, Dental, and so on.
Here are the services that can have through a professional and experienced medical coding outsourcing company.
- Have experienced coders in ICD, CPT, CDT, HSPCS, HCC, and MRA medical coding paths.
- Hospital / in-patient coding
- Emergency room e-code evaluation
- Audits to ensure the accuracy of codes
- Backlog coding resolution services
- Validation of coding
- Medical Chart Reviews
“Medical Coding Outsourcing is customized medical practice’s Requirements”
What is the difference between Domestic vs. Overseas medical coding outsourcing services?
Medical coding outsourcing companies have their coders from domestically or overseas. Generally, medical coding businesses have a good demand now. sometimes medical coding outsourcing companies are unable to hire enough coders from domestically. So they hiring professional employees from overseas.
Nowadays, hiring overseas coders is becoming famous in the U.S.
How does medical coding outsourcing affect coders?
There is no much difference between the salaries of working in a medical coding outsourcing company and working in a medical practice or hospital. Sometimes hospital employed medical coders’ costs can be high because medical coding outsourcing companies are only paying for productive hours.
Are our medical coding jobs going overseas?
International job opportunities for medical coding is growing because more health organizations moving their code work for medical coding outsourcing service. According to the MGMA, medical care provider outsourcing grew by 31% from 2011 to 2016.
Is medical coding outsourced?
Nowadays, a lot of medical practices get the service of a medical coding outsourcing company to avoid problems by having the service of in-house medical coding.
