Revenue-cycle management firms are increasingly seeing providers fully outsource revenue-cycle services rather than handle the important but tricky practice of patient billing themselves. According to Black Book Market Research, demand for outsourcing of full revenue-cycle management services in healthcare grew 48% from 2015 to 2019.
CEO Chris Klitgaard of MediRevv said that choosing to outsource offers providers a level of expertise akin to a medical professional’s specialization in clinical care. Roughly 65% of MediRevv’s client base receives fully outsourced end-to-end revenue-cycle services. “By partnering with a firm, providers are free to dedicate their focus to clinical demands while also recapturing revenue to invest back into bettering clinical technologies and processes,” Klitgaard said.
He added that hospitals and health systems often don’t have the capital to continually invest in technology, so outsourcing offers them competitive technologies with an experienced and talented staff.
Partnering with one vendor offers providers accountability and a better line of sight to an entire performance breakdown, according to Brenda Cline, president of service solutions at nThrive, No. 2 on our Largest Revenue Cycle Management Firms list.
Cline said predictive analytics can help inform broader market trends and revenue-cycle firms have easy access to the technology, giving providers who hire the firms an edge.
Huntsville (Ala.) Hospital Health System, which handles most of its revenue-cycle services in-house, has another perspective. Rob Crawford, executive director of revenue cycle services, said the system ended a partnership in the last two years. “Our patient statement services were brought back in-house to give us more control over customer service,” Crawford said. “We actually saw improved collections.”
Cline admits that not every provider relationship with outsourcing can achieve results. “Outsourcing success comes only from a true partnership with an established relationship and trust.”