What To Do When Considering Outsourcing Lab Billing
Most laboratories feel that their billing takes more time and energy than the actual laboratory work itself. From all of the bureaucracy and administrative efforts, including tasks leading up to successful payment of bills, many organizations decide to have it outsourced with experts like Synapse, so their focus is solely on providing services to patients and clinicians. In this blog, we want to help you prepare for partnering with an outsourced laboratory billing service.
Reasons To Outsource Lab Billing
A laboratory medical billing company like Synapse understands that labs have a unique set of requirements than any other medical establishment. To meet these standards, it can be troublesome to handle laborious work that could be taken care of by a dedicated team. Acquiring professional assistance is a must if you want to improve cash flow, adopt innovative technology, gain a dedicated workforce and enhance patient outcomes.
Step 1: Check CLIA License and Credentials Requirements
Deciding to work with an outsourced lab billing company may seem complicated, but it’s actually easy when you’re with the right outsourcing partner. At Synapse, we have narrowed your preparation down into easy steps for you to follow. Your transition process must be seamless and convenient. Here’s the first step: Make sure that your laboratory meets Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA) License and credentials requirements.
What is CLIA license?
The CLIA license is designed to establish quality standards for laboratory testing performed on specimens from humans, such as blood, body fluid, and tissue, for the purpose of diagnosis, prevention, or treatment of disease, or assessment of health, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Additionally, check your laboratory whether it meets the credentialing requirements for insurance carriers that you plan to accept.
Step 2: Collect Reports from Prior Years
The next thing you have to do is prepare your reports such as accounts receivable reports and other performance reports. This allows for your internal team to put together the financial data needed by your outsourced partner to know exactly where you need help with. How to map the payer IDs to the claims data in your database of reports is also essential in preparing for outsourced laboratory billing.
Step 3: Establish a Point of Contact For Better Communication
Before implementation with your outsourced partner, you need someone to lead communication between your staff and the outsourced support team. Both parties must understand the business and science of providing healthcare services. This includes learning about how your Laboratory Information System (LIS) will be networked and configured. Then, your in-house team’s workflow for laboratory tests and billing will go through an adjusting period. Your point of contact will ensure that the testing environment from the new laboratory billing setup is put in place. Most importantly, stay on top of the quality assurance tests by validating the data flowing from the LIS and billing setup.
Outsource Lab Billing With Synapse
Partnering with an outsourced company can be confusing when there’s a lot to consider: Issues around CLIA licensing and credentialing requirements to the fine points of Laboratory Information Systems and LIS connectivity. However, Synapse has gained an excellent reputation in the medical industry through our accurate, efficient, and transparent implementation of laboratory billing systems. With more than 25 years of experience, we help laboratories deploy a new and innovative system that streamlines the bottom line for better cash flow. Since it is a time-saver, you can divert your energy to performing lab tests for providers and patients.