Home Forums Discussions Feedback and Recommendations Basic (dumb) question

researshing software for new practice - going solo (FP) for 1st time. Can someone please explain what exactly PM software gives me that AC does not have yet? Is it just electronic billing portion? Have used allscripts in past but not billing portion and AC seems to have everything I need already. Thanks for any Help. More dumb questions to follow.

Atlas,

I do not use AC at all for billing. At least not at this time. It just is not robust enough to do what most docs need. But, stayed tuned because there is a billing module in the works that hopefully will be able to compete with most any.

Leslie

Actually, it is a fair question as to what a Practice Management (PM) system is. Typically it will do billing, and usually by electronic means, but not necessarily. AC does have the ability to print HCFA 1500's but by itself that would not constitute a PM system.

Beyond just generating billing, you need to track what payments are received, what is still outstanding, what partial payments are made and usually any notations to go along with that. You need to track days in receiving, both by patient and by insurance. You probably want to generate bills both for current visit (which AC can do) as well as a summary of outstanding bills, as well as possibly all account both paid and unpaid, summary. You need to be able to enter discounts for agreed services and for even self pay. You should be able to track what money was taken at the front for copays and payments on account.

You might want to track inventory. You might want to look at productivity as to what various CPT codes are paying, which insurance company is giving the highest average reimbursement.

I can go on and on. Some are nice, many are mandatory. Look around the forum even in the last 90 days, there has been a lot of discussion on this. Check out the tread what do providers want in a PM system.

Will you be doing your own billing? Amazing Charts is wonderful, but it's billing side is not functional enough for most people to use alone at this time. It is EXTREMELY difficult to keep track of where money came from and went in AC and it is also very difficult to find encounters that were not paid and have Accounts Receivable functionality.

Thanks for the responses, at this point the learning curve is so big trying to go it alone I am looking into using a billing company for now until my volume picks up, would be interested in any thoughts on this and what has worked for others just starting out, trying to keep costs and number of employees down obviously.

We are a billing service and have providers using AC now where we enter their charges. We also offer an option to host AC and link with Medisoft so the provider can enter charges in AC, have them then appear in Medisoft and then send out (direct to some payers, to a clearinghouse for most)...And you can buy the cheapest version of Medisoft ($299.95) if use choose our Basic or BasicPlus Service. You then have full use of Medisoft, including all financials.

What is your website URL?

Al

As we wait for the PM module of AC, I have started using Office Ally (to submit) and its sister program Practicemate (for accounting). We have to do double entry (only basic info) into Practicemate.

Practicemate is free and there are minimal costs for Office Ally.

Frank J. Paiano, DO
Internal Medicine
Leesburg, FL