As we have all been trained to ask, what would you do differently if there was a PM inside of AC? How was your practice going to be improved or better for you and/or your patient by having v7, the combined AC/PM.
I have no pressing need to link AC to my PM, much less have a PM inside of AC, so I wonder, what I am missing?.I would like to hear the features and benefits you were hoping for. What does the integrated HR/PM have that you want, and why?
Much of it depends on how you are doing billing now.
If there was an integrated PM, you could verify eligibility, check balances, and bill all directly from the program. Sure, these can be done by an external program, but it is clunky and time consuming. Imagine being able to make an appointment and immediately seeing that Ms. Jones has not only a $245 balance but a new $750 deductible for 2013. This would be somewhat automatic in that you could flip to the screen (or have a red button or such) that would tell you she has an outstanding balance. Eligibility could automatically be checked the day before so you would know a patient is not eligible and not have to manually check each patient against the schedule.
It would eliminate double billing that many people do. If the PM goes straight to a clearing house, it would eliminate the need for an outside billing company in many cases. You could readily check collections and billing status without having an external program.
These things would speed up reception/billing aspect of a practice and most were set to be implemented into Version 7 had that come to pass.
There are more things but these are the ones that immediately came to mind.
