Practice Makes Perfect: Maintaining physician compensation levels

In June, the Medical Group Management Association released the results of a questionnaire that ranked members' most pressing practice management challenges. In this edition of “Practice Makes Perfect,” we'll tackle No. 7 on that list: Maintaining physician compensation levels in your practice.

Your organization might be working to stabilize operating costs or investing in new technology to better monitor patient populations. Perhaps you are exploring new payment mechanisms and are beginning to incorporate quality and patient-satisfaction components into physician compensation. MGMA data recently identified these new measures and examined their ties to physician compensation plans for the first time. Although there are many challenges to maintaining physician compensation levels in this environment, there are also many ways to mitigate potential issues. Consider these four ways to help maintain physician compensation levels:

• Keep physicians engaged. Physician compensation begins with physicians. Engaging physicians by building quality, patient satisfaction or productivity measures into compensation plans ensures their commitment to the organization and to their patients.
• Be knowledgeable about coding and documentation. Make sure that physicians and the billing and coding staff are well trained and understand appropriate coding and documentation. Optimize the technology in your practice by training the entire staff on how to capture relevant and meaningful patient care information in your practice management system and electronic health records.
• Understand revenue-cycle management. The evolving healthcare environment presents ongoing and often escalating challenges in practice management. Make sure your staff has been trained properly and has access to excellent resources and information about revenue-cycle management. Continually benchmark your practice against performance standards. Ensure proper procedures are being followed to capture patient information, including inputting demographic and clinical information, as well as billing and collecting for the visit. This will keep your practice fiscally healthy and help ensure compensation levels for physicians are maintained.
• Leverage benchmarking data and other tools. Make sure that your practice management system can provide the granular detail required on the financial performance of your organization. Consider overlaying third-party data-mining tools to provide the necessary information you need, and be sure that your EHR provides the same level of analytical tools. Then, use benchmarking data or other industry information to monitor and evaluate your efforts. Having access to tools and resources that highlight physician compensation and practice costs will be beneficial in monitoring your efforts and determining ways to improve.

There's no secret recipe for maintaining physician compensation levels. However, if you incorporate ingredients like physician engagement, consistent attention and fine-tuning to the revenue-cycle management process, and add up-to-date benchmarking information, you will be positioned for success.