We all know that Healthcare Providers are trying their best to sustain their practice, especially after the new healthcare reforms. It is the same scenario with US based healthcare outsourcing companies as well. Since their end-clients are facing the changes, the healthcare outsourcing companies also face the same concerns. It is to surmount these challenges that offshore medical billing companies are in existence. Like there are two sides to every story, medical billing outsourcing to offshore medical billing companies has its own pros and cons. Lets discuss a few of them:
Pros: On the positive side of offshore medical billing, there are several advantages to discuss,
- Cost Factor: Performing all kinds of billing operations by incorporating new changes in-house is not an easy task. It requires a lot of spending on space, overhead costs, recruitment, training, and technology. When a part of medical billing and coding operations is outsourced to an offshore medical billing company, there is a good chance for a medical billing company to save money.
- Volume: The volume of medical billing operations has increased a lot as medical billing companies handle multiple Healthcare Providers at a time. Medical billing outsourcing happens to be the best option as it reduces the burden of medical billing companies by sharing most of the mundane repetitive work.
- Accuracy: As mentioned earlier, when medical billing companies handle huge volumes of billing operations, the accuracy level declines. However, with an offshore medical billing company’s help, they can perform medical billing and coding functions precisely without any compromise on quality.
- Bandwidth: When part of the work is sent to an offshore medical billing company, it liberates the bandwidth within the organization. Instead of handling day-to-day operations, only guidance and audit needs to be performed. The liberated extra bandwidth can be utilized to acquire new clients and on-board them with very less ‘transition bumps’.
Cons: Instead of calling them as disadvantages, it can be termed as ‘fear factor’ of healthcare outsourcing companies about offshore medical billing companies,
- Data Security: It is the first main ‘fear-factor’ that most medical billing companies have about offshore vendors. They hesitate to share the confidential information (PHI) with the offshore vendor and thus, eliminate the idea of healthcare outsourcing. What they fail to understand is that the new changes to HIPAA mandate the same level of punitive actions for breach on offshore medical billing companies that are applicable to them. Some vendors like eCare have pro-actively acquired ISO certifications both for processes and Information security and have better security measures than even some of the US based companies.
- Choosing the Right One: Some medical billing companies fear that they might end up partnering with the wrong offshore medical billing vendor and rightly so. There are many instances where a choice is made in haste without proper due diligence that results in a horrible experience. With proper research and due diligence they can find a good, reliable medical billing company in India like e-Care.
By partnering with the right offshore medical billing company, US based healthcare outsourcing service providers can easily eliminate these fear factors and enjoy great benefits that offshore medical billing companies have to offer.