There’s a tremendous shift taking place in the healthcare sector. Each year, more hospitals, clinics, nursing homes, and other health facilities upgrade from manual paperwork to automated billing.
Billing tools not only make your work efficient but also cut down costs, ensure you’re compliant and bolsters productivity. Medical equipment (ME) suppliers now rely on medical billing software to optimize costs and streamline the highly complicated and error-prone billing process.
But when it comes to selecting the right tools, most healthcare administration organizations want to strike a neat balance between cost and efficiency. In this article, we help you understand the most crucial things you need from an HME/DME tool.
What Is ME Billing?
Before choosing any software, you must understand the basics of home medical equipment billing. HMEs are medical equipment designed for helping patients from home. Both professional and non-professional caregivers can manage the use of HMEs. This equipment includes:
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Hospital Beds
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Mobility aids such as wheelchairs, walkers, and stairlifts
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CPAPs
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Shower seats and toilet chairs
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Orthotics
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Incontinence, urinals, catheters, and irrigation equipment
Billing this equipment is a bit more complicated than typical medical billing as it involves several parties. It involves sending claims to payers, managing HME inventory, taking care of compliance, managing eligibilities and authorization, AR collections, and payment posting.
The entire process takes a lot of personnel and time. To make things efficient and smooth, HME software automates most areas of the billing cycle. This reduces errors, leads to quick payments, and increases productivity.
Why Is HME Billing Complex?
With the HME business, you must put extra effort into getting accreditation and FDA licensure for oxygen. You also have to meet state-specific regulations and adhere to HIPPA requirements. Besides the tough legal environment, HME medical billers must intricately combine billing for HME services and HME equipment.
When dieticians, physical therapists, and palliative care nurses make in-home visits, billers must capture the costs of these services correctly. Also, some equipment comes with accessories, but insurance may not cover some of these accessories.
Having all this in mind, you can see that ME billing is quite complex and can be a lengthy process. Because of these complexities, durable and home medical equipment companies increasingly rely on billing software to streamline the process.
Choosing the Best Medical Equipment Billing Software
You’ve made the right decision to opt for medical billing software, but how do you know which tool is right for you? Let’s see things you must consider to help you select software suitable for your healthcare organization.
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Select Software Designed Specifically for the ME Businesses
In the fast-pacing environment of changing HME legislation, rising customer expectations, and changing payer guidelines, it’s never been more vital to choose the most efficient and innovative DME/HME solution. If you’re a ME supplier, generic medical billing solutions may be challenging as they may not capture all the relevant processes. Even if you’re a large healthcare facility with a department dealing with home medical equipment, it’s good to choose billing solutions specific to your department.
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Consider the Types of Features in the Software
The amount of features in an HME software determines its capability. Here are the top features to look out for in a home medical equipment system:
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Seamless integration: Most medical providers want software solutions that integrate fully with EMR software and practice management software. Ensure the tool you’re choosing integrates with other medical tools effortlessly.
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Claims management: A good DME solution has a claims management feature that allows providers to manage all aspects of claims, from payments to denials and authorizations. Select a system that allows you to submit error-free claims.
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Patient eligibility verification: The best home medical equipment software automatically verifies insurance and patient information. This feature is crucial as it saves you time and minimizes errors leading to denials.
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Payment posting: You need software that allows you to streamline your collections by letting you know how much to collect from payers and patients. With this feature, you can automate the creation, send invoices and make comprehensive payment e-statements.
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Intelligent automation: Through automation, you can meet both state and payer requirements with ease. Medical billing solutions with intelligent automation capabilities ensure your business meets all compliance regulations, enabling your business to receive quick reimbursements.
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Take Note of Security
The primary concern for most ME providers is whether particular software is secure. Because medical billing involves storing and sharing sensitive patient information, healthcare organizations want a system that meets all HIPAA guidelines. You know that compliance isn’t enough when it comes to data security. So, you want software designed and engineered with security as one of its pillars.
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Consider Ease-of-use
How can you navigate through the software/ are there any templates? Do you want software everyone in your organization can use, even with little tech knowledge? We have seen providers complain online about their struggles to access certain software features. When shopping, ensure you request a free trial or a demo to help you know how the software feels. Outstanding ease of use can dramatically reduce the time your team uses to locate and use features in software.
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Watch Out for Reviews
Reviews on social media, online forums, and from other healthcare providers can help you know the type of software you’re about to buy. Look for software with few complaints. Also, be wary of the tools whose customer support team doesn’t respond to users in review sites such as Capterra and G2. Ask around within your community of healthcare providers about the right tools for ME billing.
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Go for Software With Fast Onboarding
You can save much time with software that supports fast onboarding. That is, it should be customizable, easy to navigate, and has minimal clutter to minimize confusion. Such tools contain shortcuts, widgets, and other ease-of-use features, such as the search button. Fast onboarding means anyone can use the software with little training, saving you time and money. The user interface should be simple, allowing you to easily code and bill HME equipment.
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Ensure It Is Scalable
Can the software grow as your business grows? Make sure the software you’re choosing allows you to add more data and customizations to your business. Also, ensure that the tool allows you to migrate your data to other platforms with ease. It’s crucial to adopt a system that adopts changes as they happen.
Should You Buy a Medical Billing Software?
Most healthcare organizations are transitioning to using efficient tools that align with EMR, and so should you. For home medical equipment suppliers, HME/DME solutions are must-have because these tools enhance:
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Efficient reporting
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Cost reduction
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Payment posting
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Revenue cycle management
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Regular updates of compliance information
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Order fulfillment and tracking
If you’re in the HME/DME industry, it’s prime time you consider procuring HME software to help your teams manage the coding and billing of claims easier. Such software will enable you to stay ahead of the competition and concentrate more on the core aspects of your business.
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