Dear Healthcare Colleagues,
Research shows that in moments of uncertainty, involving a significant decision, people rely on independent experts for help. We turn to someone who can help us wade through the confusing mess of options. We look for an unbiased third party who is an authority and can point us in the right direction.
Panacea announces that new services will be offered in conjunction with its proven Hospital Zero-Base Pricing system to help clients better meet the CMS pricing transparency requirements.
During a recent webinar on Developing a Pricing Strategy for the 2019 CMS Transparency Requirement, Panacea surveyed 450 healthcare executives to gauge their readiness in meeting the January 1, 2019 CMS Final Transparency Rule deadline. Learn more
Hospitals have just a few months to ensure their prices are rational and defensible to meet the January 1, 2019 deadline.
St. Paul, MN—August, 2018—Panacea, a leading provider of mid-revenue cycle management, innovative software and enterprise-level educational solutions announced today that despite industry push-back during the comment period, the CMS Final Rule requires hospitals to publish their standard charges on their website for consumers to access.
Accordingly, Mark Spehar, Senior Vice President, Financial Services at Panacea stated, “with this requirement we urge hospitals to start now and use their scarce time wisely to ensure that they can document and defend the rationale behind each line item price in their chargemaster to meet the January 1, 2019 deadline. Additionally, they should initiate the process of publishing their CDM on their web-site along with proper disclaimers and clarifications on those instances where charges might impact patient financial responsibility. We also advise hospitals to consider analyzing their historical claims and payment data to provide additional information to consumers such as recent historical average charges by DRG and average charges and payment levels segregated between in-network and out-of-network patients, even if this information is rolled out in a later phase.”
Specifically, the CMS final rule states, “as one step to further improve the public accessibility of charge information, effective January 1, 2019, we announce the update to our guidelines to require hospitals to make available a list of their current standard charges via the Internet in a machine, readable format and to update this information at least annually, or more often as appropriate. This could be in the form of the chargemaster itself or another form of the hospital’s choice, as long as the information is in machine readable format.”
Ted Barduson, President of Panacea stated today, “as the industry leader in hospital, physician and drug defensible and rational pricing and with the recent release of our new Hospital Zero-Base Pricing® technology designed to swiftly process multiple hospitals and regions simultaneously, we are ready to assist our clients and providers during this crunch period. This technology combined with our access to current hospital and free-standing physician and provider charge data will allow hospitals to implement defensible yet optimum prices.”
In July 2018, Panacea’s hospital and physician pricing experts presented a webinar where the importance of hospitals charges was discussed along with an instructive seven step approach to prepare for the CMS proposed rule and how technology can help providers develop and maintain rational chargemaster prices. The complimentary webinar title: Debunking the Myth: Why Charges Still Matter in the Age of Pricing Transparency is available on Panacea’s Insights thought leadership platform.
The push for health care price transparency is nothing new and can be traced back almost 20 years. When CMS released their proposed 2019 Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS) rules including “requirements for hospitals to make public, a list of their standard charges via the internet”, it further underscored CMS’ continued effort for hospitals and health systems to provide price transparency. Learn more
Is your revenue integrity program performing at full capacity?
Perhaps more important, do you have a revenue integrity program (or department) at all?
A survey conducted by the Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) reports that less than half (44%) of providers contacted have a revenue integrity department to track accurate coding and charge capture, establish reasonable pricing for services, ensure legal and regulatory compliance, and develop effective financial reporting. Yet those that have established revenue integrity programs have realized an overall increase in net revenue.
Written By: Fred Stodolak, Executive Vice President, Mark Spehar, Senior Vice President, Financial Services, Henry Gutierrez, Vice President, Financial Services
There is an increasing debate surrounding CMS FY2019 IPPS proposed rule, published April 24, that would require hospitals “to make public a list of their standard charges via the internet.” Discussions around this topic have pointed out a number of valid arguments:
Lehi Utah, May 10, 2018
Panacea announced today that their Hospital Zero-Base Pricing® system will align with the proposed IPPS rules for FY 2019 released by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). The proposed rules issued by CMS on April 24 require healthcare organizations to publish their “standard charges” online by January 1, 2019 and update these charges on an annual or more frequent basis where needed. Learn more
St. Paul, MN – April 9, 2019 – Panacea, a leading provider of mid-revenue cycle management software, consulting and educational solutions, is proud to announce that Senior Vice President Mark Spehar and Executive Vice President Frederick Stodolak will present at the Healthcare Finance Management Association’s (HFMA) 2019 Virtual Conference on April 18, 2019 from 1:00-2:00 p.m. Central Time. Their session is titled “The Pricing Transparency Conundrum – Juggling Rational Price Development with Healthcare Consumerism Leading Practices.”