Administrative Waste
A new survey shows that almost “half of practice-based providers report difficulty communicating with and interacting with payers, compared with almost a third of facility-based providers. Among the top issues identified by providers as leading to dissatisfaction with payers are: redundant information requests, denied claims and uncompensated care, as well as inconsistent rules among health plans.”
Why are we dealing with these middlemen (aka idiots) anymore? They create hurdles and friction. They rip you off and make you work to get paid. And they take most of the money!
In the article they use the term “provider abrasion”. Uh….ya think?
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doug,
i love your tenacity, but that is not always possible. certain markets, especially rural areas, do not have enough folks who can do dpc to float 1 doc, let alone many. i know, as i have tried to grow a practice in the rural carolinas.
600 total patients. That is all you need. Talk to Vance Lassey MD in Holton, KS
I agree with politovski. There used to be a thing called solo practice, used to be cash based and
now it’s completely gone in my area. If one chooses the wrong area, with the wrong payer mix
ie. high public aid, high medicare, they WILL go out of business and I don’t care what they do or
how much they hustle.
I presume Doug did due diligence of the area he settled in and even then it’s a gamble. I remember he no longer does hospital care and that is not a dig on my part. If one can make a living without that, by all means. There is some risk in DPC and if one is careful, they can pull it off and be satisfied. My contention now is why take that risk if one gets into the “right” specialty they can have 5 job offers before they are done with fellowship? FP used to promise a less rigorous schedule even if one did office, hospital practice and took call. Still had free time to pursue other interests. Now, one is stuck “finger massaging” a keyboard and doing paperwork tasks that support people used to be able to do for the doctor. Now the doctor has to piss on everything like a male dog. It is never going to get better period. (Unless of course one gets DPC right and ends up with a patient mix that supports it.) I’m sorry Doug, I still have to respectfully disagree that DPC will work “everywhere”. End up someplace where people are too used to sucking off the government teat and you’ll be burning “your shingle” to keep warm in the winter.
On average, one DPC clinic is going up every day in this country. You only need 600 patients to make a good living. You see about 30-35 patient visits a week. This is the answer for FP
I have a new contract with Cigna but half of my recent claims are still paid at the old (lower) rate. I tried to talk to the company rep but they say there isn’t one in my area! Another company denies every mental health code that I submit. This has been going on for over six months. We have to call the insurance rep for every mental health claim to get her to fix it manually. They say it is a hardware glitch. For six months!?!? Another one denied a claim because a patient dropped a drill on their foot. They say it is workers compensation. He is retired and did it at home. The cost of “fixing” these claims takes time and since my biller has to work to fix these claims I can actually end up losing money trying to get paid.
Can you go DPC (Direct Primary Care)?