Healthcare organizations face mounting challenges in their battle to control costs and deliver quality patient care. Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) continues to be one of the most daunting obstacles to realizing efficiencies without compromising care.  Fragmented processes, disjointed data sources and increasing regulatory policies all add layer of complexity and costs in an area of healthcare that touches every player including the patient.

Intelligent Process Automation (IPA) is emerging as one of the most transformational technologies that can help healthcare providers by automating many of their labor intensive, costly, and error prone tasks. IPA has the potential to free up resources from mundane administrative tasks and unlock data that is buried in fragmented applications. Utilizing IPA in RCM also helps healthcare providers maintain compliance and increase collections rates. This, in turn, accelerates their cash flow, reduces their accounts receivables, and minimizes write-offs.

So how does IPA work?

Process automation has the ability to interface with the same systems that an organization’s people are using every day in tasks ranging from eligibility through collections.  IPA also connects to an organizations’ systems including electronic health records, billing systems, patient payment portals, and credit card processing applications. IPA works with these systems to execute the same tasks people do but in a fraction of the time and cost. Each process is repeatable all day every day essentially providing the organization with a non-stop work force and since each step is happening every time nothing is ever skipped or forgotten.

What processes are right for IPA?

Simple process automation tools are becoming more mainstream for simple, rule-based, repeatable processes.  But more complex processes, such as RCM, require smarter tools which can understand the complexities and high level of variation that is found in the end-to-end process of getting paid.  IPA is currently being applied to processes like:

• Out of Pocket Estimation
• Prior Authorizations
• Patient communication
• Processes which require interfacing with many third-party applications and online portals
• Process claim denials

Applying IPA enables healthcare providers to realize additional revenues, capture information for claims disputes, and gain insights into the efficiency and effectiveness of their revenue cycle.  IPA has amazing potential to make revenue cycle management a strategic strength versus a cost and administrative burden.

Learn how Myndshft’s intelligent automation application, M:IA™, can help automate your RCM processes.