Quick Tips for a Financially Challenged ASC: Q&A With Vickie Sanders of Nueterra Healthcare

Vickie L. Sanders is vice president of business office services for Nueterra Healthcare.

Q: Our ASC isn't performing as well as in the past. What are some areas we should focus on to identify possible problems and start improving our situation?

Vickie Sanders: To assist a struggling ASC, I would first:

• review staff assignment, roles and responsibilities to ensure adequate staffing to case volume
• review facility financial policy and procedures; and
• review and analyze the revenue cycle step-by-step to identify any potential breakdown in the flow of information and follow-up effort between transcription, coding, charge entry, electronic billing, billing rejections, A/R follow up, payment posting and adjustments to include bad debt write-off.

Once the initial review is complete, a more detailed review would follow to include analyzing:

• payor contracts;
• trends in revenue, payments or denials by payor; adjustments to
• include bad debt; and specialty mix; and
• high dollar A/R balance review.

The result of these efforts would produce a detailed report of the findings in addition to an action plan with recommendations on how to implement a plan of action and resolve the current problem.

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