Today’s technology-driven world is continually generating data, creating both opportunities and challenges. Healthcare CFOs face increased pressure to analyze the data, connect the dots, and identify patterns that will optimize a company’s growth while keeping its costs in check. Navigating continuity through unpredictable times is a difficult task right now. With the right automation strategy, healthcare CFOs can help drive transformation and deliver actionable insights, but where to begin?
Take Advantage of Low Hanging Fruit
PwC stated that “Automation alone does not save money or improve performance, people and processes also have to change.” By placing a toe in the water of automation, you’ll not only see the same tasks finished faster and more accurately, but you’ll see a quick return on investment and a decrease in the administrative data burden experienced by human workers. A good area to begin is in revenue cycle management. Areas like claim denial management, prior authorization eligibility requests, and third-party payment processing are well-suited for a digital workforce, allowing machines to perform the same repetitive tasks previously requiring hours of manual data input. This is what one of our clients experienced:
“Many of our claims had to be double checked, but the task was too overwhelming when done manually. In some instances it was the absence of a modifier, others simply had to be double checked for accuracy and then released, but the sheer number of claims made it difficult to touch each file in a timely manner.”
– Leyla Cox, Auditor, Phoebe Putney Hospital
Empower People to Work Smarter, Not Harder
Organizations struggle to manage change management across their healthcare IT applications and infrastructure. HR functions, password changes, new releases, and security challenges cause major disruptions to the business of healthcare. Delays are expensive and affect bottom line revenue. By employing a “digital workforce,” hospitals and health systems can add a level of security and accuracy, mitigate risk, and remove the constant burden of orchestrating a manual process open to internal and external breaks, breaches, and performance issues.
“It would have taken someone 3,840 hours to enter this data manually across three databases, test and live, not factoring in breaks or common errors which would need rework. The savings in personnel time and assurance of error-free data entry— priceless.”
– Rich Temple, Saint Clare’s Health System
Automation Changes the Role of the IT Department
It’s a good thing. Automation allows the IT department to better manage systems, reduce wasted resources, and improve ROI. By taking routine tasks and offloading them to machines, automation allows the IT staff to focus on higher priority issues to improve the IT infrastructure. The benefits of automation can be broken down from the perspective of convenience for the IT staff who work directly with the automation tools daily, and from the business perspective of CFOs who are looking to cut back on costs and save time and money. Tasks can range from onboarding activities, as well as constant feedback and data that can be used to assess performance issues.
“By using Boston WorkStation, we empower people to think critically about processes and evaluate opportunities for enhancements. This helps the hospital organizationally, financially, and it has assisted us in increasing excellence in our execution.”
– Kim Scaccia, Halifax Health
Automation and Productivity in the Lab
Like many care organizations, Mount Auburn found that attaching accurate patient information to specimens going from clinics and physician offices to hospital labs was a problem. In some cases, only handwritten patient information accompanied a specimen to the hospital creating many inaccuracies including wrong insurance, wrong address, or simply illegible writing. Lab personnel were taking time to register patients using this information which delayed lab orders and ultimately caused billing delays, costly corrections, and re-billing issues.
“We have been able to realize faster turn-around in billing with fewer corrections and our lab personnel are ordering lab work instead of registering patients.”
– Robert Todd, Mount Auburn Hospital
PwC surveyed 288 US CFOs and finance leaders between May 4-6, 2020. The Pulse survey emphasized that the workplace is undergoing fundamental changes based on recent events. In healthcare, over half of CFOs reported that they plan to “accelerate automation and new ways of working,” compared to 40% of CFOs overall.
As we begin to reign in financial losses, shorter staffing, and remote working conditions, automation solutions enable us to accelerate productivity, improve cost containment, and support the healthcare ecosystem.
Why Boston Software Systems?
Boston Software Systems understands that people are driving the processes in caring for thousands of patients every day. For additional information on how Boston Software Systems can help your organization, give us a call. We won’t take up much of your time and can get things running quickly, usually within a few weeks, so you can realize a fast ROI.