Business and Clinical Operations | Financial Performance & Management | Governance, Management & Organizational Leadership | New Practice Development

Financial Performance & Management

• Financial Performance Monitoring
• Patient Account Management
• Fee Schedules
• Reimbursement Analysis
• Budget Preparation and Management
• Expense Management

Revenue Enhancement
Maximizing collections of revenue requires an appropriate infrastructure as well as efficient policies and procedures at every step of the patients' involvement with the practice. Health plan contracts and fee schedules must provide for reasonable reimbursement rates and terms, and credentialing must be up-to-date. Appropriate staffing levels support all of the required procedures, and staff must fully understand coding and billing requirements in order to bill correctly the first time. Advances in technology support efficient and accurate practices. Clear and effective policies and procedures must be in place from the time the patient accesses the practice until the account has been satisfied.

Measuring and Monitoring Financial Performance
How do you know how well your practice is doing? How does this year's performance compare to last? Is the practice growing? How is the practice doing compared to similar practices? There are critical financial measures for practices and clinics that should be monitored regularly and used as a basis for decision making and planning. These measures are gauges of production, efficiency and effectiveness of operating procedures, and cost, and provide important information about how well the practice is functioning in different areas. The indicators can also be used to do internal and external benchmarking, allowing providers to measure themselves against others in the practice as well as peers in other practices. Think of these measures as a Practice Report Card ¬ and use them to help improve your practice's performance.

Expense Management
Good financial practices include managing both large capital and smaller operating expenses of the practice or clinic. There are many opportunities to reduce and control expenses. Participating in purchasing contracts for supplies, maintaining an effective inventory and ordering system, appropriate use of technology, and managing staff overtime are several examples. Well functioning accounting software is essential in tracking expenses by providing data for monitoring, as well as to compare performance against targets and benchmarks. And understanding the total cost of running the practice as well as costs by provider helps to compare costs to others in the same area. It's best to manage the practice costs than to have the costs manage the practice