Medical Account Solutions » Healthcare providers

Golfing, Networking and Support for Mitochondrial Disease

Bill Baylis — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 14:09:55 +0000

Zachary Foundation

Come join Michael Friedberg of HNLY, and other healthcare industry members in support of the Zachary Foundation on October 5, 2011 at the Barry L. Schiff Memorial Healthcare Classic golfing event.

The Zachary Foundation was founded by the parents and friends of Zachary Friedberg of Morganville, New Jersey who suffers from a rare form of Mitochondrial Disease.

Bring your golf game and come out.

MAS has been in many of The Zachary Foundation golf outings and they have always been a lot of fun. This year they are honoring three of the long time supporters Andrew Goold, VP of The Healthsearch Group, James Y. Lee, FACHE Executive VP and COO of Lawrence Hospital Center and Adam K. Weinstein, FACHE VP for Regulatory Affairs and Corporate Compliance New York Hospital Queens.

Michael Friedberg who has played an important role in healthcare through the years and deserves our industry’s full support, says “Throughout the years we have been privileged to have support from many people and organizations, it is the commitment of these three individuals that has been the driving force for our success. Their gift to Zachary and children like him who suffer from Mitochondrial Disease has been given not for recognition or personal gain but only due to each of their own selflessness. My family and the entire Mitochondrial Disease community are forever in their debt.”

Registration is still open! I look forward to seeing you there!

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Lets Hire America First.

Bill Baylis — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 14:00:18 +0000

About a year ago MAS wrote a blog post Forget Outsourcing, Try Rural Sourcing. MAS Agrees! about the value of “Rural Sourcing” and the need to keep jobs in the US instead of sending them overseas.

And today… jobs are still the big topic for all of us. In last week’s address to Congress and the country, President Obama laid out his plan for creating jobs. He stated the plan’s core goal: “The purpose of the American Jobs Act is simple: to put more people back to work and more money in the pockets of those who are working.”

The speech made me think of Linda McMahon’s quote on how jobs are created, “It’s very simple how you create jobs. An entrepreneur takes risk. He or she believes that they create a good or service that is sold for more than it costs to create it. If an entrepreneur thinks he can do that he creates a job.”

The heart and soul of the economy is small business. If you want to put Americans to work, it seems like a no brainer to begin with small businesses and entrepreneurs of America! We are standing ready to do whatever it takes to get the job done and start pumping some confidence back into the economy. Confident business owners hire.

Some companies may still have a need to send jobs overseas, but with the amount of people looking for work, MAS thinks it makes sense to hire people right here at home.

Small businesses can be creative in their hiring by focusing on their core expertise and outsourcing other job functions to entrepreneurs and consultants.

We use outsourcing to simplify things and be leaner and it’s been very effective for us. We hire out in key fields like IT, Accounting/CFO and other services for pennies on the dollar–with better results. This lets us focus on what we’re good at–is medical billing and collections.Trusting our expert consultants has paid off for us.

The biggest win of all is that it’s freed us up to hire people to build our core business and create more local jobs for Americans.

So how can outsourcing to experts help you streamline your business and help boost the economy at the same time?

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Have You Heard About the New Medicare Plan that’s Got Hospitals Upset?

Webmaster — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 13:23:27 +0000

A recent NY Times article by Robert Spears entitled “Medicare Plan for Payments Irks Hospitals” talks about upcoming changes to the way Medicare pays out to hospitals based on performance.

As stated in the article “for the first time in its history, Medicare will soon track spending on millions of individual beneficiaries, reward hospitals that hold down costs and penalize those whose patients prove most expensive.”

It’s another take on pay for performance which can leave hospitals responsible for the cost of care rendered not only by them, but also by any doctors the patient sees after they leave the hospital.

We’d love to know what you think about this plan to “pay 4 performance”. Leave us a comment after you’ve read the article.

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Don’t you agree that Pay 4 Performance Just Makes Dollars and Cents?

Webmaster — Mon, 09 May 2011 13:28:12 +0000

Can you imagine paying someone for a job not done? Unfortunately sometimes when we hire employees, consultants or service professionals we end up paying them for a job half done. We feel obligated to honor contracts even if we don’t agree with the quality of the work performed.

We know that’s a tough pill to swallow. That’s why at MAS we believe strongly that clients shouldn’t pay unless we deliver. That’s the reasoning behind our Pay 4 Performance guarantee- we don’t get paid unless our clients get paid.

If you like the sound of it, click here to learn more about our Pay 4 Performance program.

Even if you’re not one of our medical billing clients, it might give you food for thought the next time you enter into a service contract!

Don’t forget to comment on this post or on our Facebook page to let us know what you think!

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ACOs-Accountable Care Organizations Part 2- The Cons Against Them

Webmaster — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 14:45:07 +0000

In our earlier blog ACOs-Accountable Care Organizations Part 2- The Pros for Them I talked about the arguments supporting the creation of ACOs. This blog installment presents arguments against them.

Accountable Care Organizations are a new concept intended to save Medicare dollars provided for in Obamacare. They are also a radical new approach to healthcare that will fundamentally change the relationship between doctors and Medicare patients. Sadly if these ACOs become reality more people will die from treatable conditions.

ACOs sound innocuous enough, they are “simply networks of hospitals and doctors that agree to manage all the medical needs of at least 5,000 Medicare patients for at least three years.” Similar to traditional Medicare billing these doctors and hospitals will be paid in a fee for service system funded by Medicare.

The insidiousness of these Accountable Care Organizations arises in the fact that the federal government through the Medicare program would offer bonuses to providers in an ACO who are able to keep down costs while meeting specific standards for quality.

Stated differently, doctors and hospitals will be paid by the government to push patients toward less expensive treatments including President Barack Obama’s example of prescribing the pain pill instead of recommending a pacemaker. This amounts to the government having a serious hand in what treatments people receive, a drastic departure from traditional American healthcare.

What’s worse is that since this is largely behind the scenes, people may not even know their doctor or hospital is part of an ACO and therefore may not question if their doctor is giving them all the options rather than only the cheap ones. While it is true that these doctors and hospitals will need to meet certain standards of care, if public schools are any example of government standards anyone, who plans on getting sick or growing old should be very worried.

The Obama administration’s Health and Human Services department insists the creation of Accountable Care Organizations will incentivize doctors to keep their patients healthy. However, many observers insist the more realistic outcome to expect is patients being denied treatments because of cost considerations as the doctor now has a vested interest in providing as few tests and prescribing the fewest amount of prescriptions and surgeries possible.

Pretty strong arguments against.What do you think? Now’s the time to speak up and let your opinion be heard while ACOs are still taking shape. We’ll be keeping a close eye on things so stay tuned for more ACO related blogs from MAS.

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ACOs-Accountable Care Organizations Part 1- The Pros for Them

Webmaster — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 14:45:24 +0000

I recently announced that I’d be starting a blog series on ACOs-Accountable Care Organizations. Here’s the first part of the blog series presenting an argument for ACOs.

Accountable Care Organizations are a new concept intended to save Medicare dollars provided for in HealthCare Reform. Spokesmen for the Obama administration say these new forms of providing healthcare will be able to save untold amounts in Medicare spending by reducing waste and unnecessary procedures ordered by doctors performing defensive medicine.

The blog post Accountable Care Organizations, Explained by Jenny Gold gives a pretty good overview of ACOs.

In it, she outlines ACOs as simply networks of hospitals and doctors that agree to manage all the medical needs of at least 5,000 Medicare patients for at least three years. Doctors and hospitals participating in Accountable Care Organizations will be paid through a fee for service system similar to traditional Medicare billing. The major difference between an ACO and traditional Medicare lies in the fact that these doctors and hospitals will receive bonuses from Medicare funds if they are able to keep costs down. This will partly be done by sharing services within the ACO according to members of the administration. Since this difference is largely behind the scenes, patients may not even know they are a part of an Accountable Care Organization.

Even though doctors will be incentivized to keep costs low, these doctors will also need to maintain certain standards of care “as the Secretary [of Health and Human Services] shall determine,” in order to keep their contracts. Further, despite the fact that bonuses will be paid, proponents of ACOs argue that there will still be aggregate savings in the long term.

Among these proponents, the Obama administration’s Health and Human Services department insists this payment of bonuses to doctors and hospitals for reduced billing to Medicare will incentivize doctors to keep their patients healthy by practicing preventative medicine rather than only treating patients when they are already sick. According to the administration, this will save money.

So what do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts, so please be sure to comment and share this post with others. Stay tuned, the next blog will focus on the argument against ACOs.

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Get linkedIn to the Turnaround of Healthcare!

Webmaster — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 18:27:22 +0000

All too often our issues with healthcare revolves around political issues, whether or not we can get access to treatment or coverage under our insurance providers and so on. On the front lines institutions battle with overworked billing departments and indifferences with insurance providers. Thrown in budget cuts and having to do more with less and still provide top care to patients who are dealing with serious health issues is an almost impossible task.

With all that is going on today, rarely is there a place where healthcare’s best and brightest come together to take on the challenges ahead.

We all know there is power in numbers so we’ve launched a group on LinkedIn called Turnaround Healthcare.

Turnaround Healthcare is a professional community for those who are dedicated to improving the wellbeing for today’s American Healthcare system through better management and implementing best practices.

Outside of healthcare, research tells us that teams working together are more successful and make fewer mistakes than do individuals. These studies show a strong relationship between qualities such as flexibility, adaptability, resistance to stress, cohesion, retention and morale with effective team performance.

Join us!! Healthcare experts, providers and networkers, let’s take our business know-how and entrepreneurial spirit to the healthcare world and mentor them to turnaround.

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MAS is Proud to Announce the Launch of our Newsletter Your Medical Billing Office News

Webmaster — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 13:54:36 +0000

Information is key and at MAS, we’re proud to do our part to help keep others informed about topics, tips and news related to the medical billing industry. The picture below is a sneak peek of our bi-monthly newsletter. Join our list for your full copy today!

Your Medical Billing Office Newsletter Preview

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St Vincent’s Hospital and the elections? It’s the core issue.

Bill Baylis — Mon, 01 Nov 2010 14:00:38 +0000

Election Day is here tomorrow. There are a lot of serious issues to consider when voting. My thoughts, as I am sure yours are, center around the dysfunction of today’s government and what we can do to get out of the economic mess and get our county back on track.

The choices that our elected officials make for us have serious long term impact on our lives. When I think of all the various election ads, propaganda and promises going around, it reminds me of the drama and devastation MAS and others experienced with one decision made by elected officials–the closing of St. Vincent’s Hospital.

When they decided to close St. Vincent’s Hospital, had damaging ripple effects. To me, seeing the hospital close was painful but maybe there were lessons for us to learn from.

For many years MAS was proud to be one of the hard-working vendors of this caring institution. Our MAS team was honored to be a part of such a pioneering and historic hospital as St Vincent’s, treated not only passengers on the Titanic, but also AIDS victims in the 1980′s when few other facilities would. When they decided to close St. Vincent’s it was like losing a part of the MAS family. Maybe because it was because St Vincent’s was one of MAS’ original clients and we wanted to keep it that way.
While working with the institution through Chapter 11, St Vincent’s management asked its many employees and vendors to tighten their belts to help the hospital through the bankruptcy process. All involved did what they could to help because we thought taking temporary pay cuts would do the trick to put a struggling hospital back on its feet. For a while, it looked as if things were taking a turn for the better. But the one thing we did not count on was that the core was already rotten; like our government has become, it was rife with bureaucracy and corruption.

Behind the scenes a snowball of bad choices had already begun. Mark Levin, in a recent New York Magazine article entitled “St Vincent’s Is the Lehman Brothers of Hospitals” lays out details that lead to the hospital’s behind the scenes corruption and demise.

Davis writes “St. Vincent’s plight has been portrayed by public officials and the media as a story of local misfortune—a community losing a vital piece of its infrastructure and a centerpiece of its identity to a combination of mismanagement, the recession, and bad luck. The truth, though, is considerably more alarming. St. Vincent’s collapse is only the most visible symptom of an ongoing financial emergency facing the city’s five dozen remaining hospitals and threatening those they serve. In a sense, St. Vincent’s is the Lehman Brothers of the local hospital industry: an institution whose dramatic disappearance, once unthinkable, raises dire questions about the viability of the entire system.”
I wonder if our leaders are taking our citizens down a similar path. As I listen to various campaign speeches, I hear eerie echoes of the bankrupted hospital as our ”wannabe” leaders try to convince us how just one more tax will do the trick! Or, that this bailout will be the one to build a stronger future!
For MAS the lesson is clear-Let’s fix the core issues first! Like St Vincent Hospital, our country is more than worth saving from bankruptcy! When we use tried and true steps, there is no doubt our people will see the logic in it and rally around it.

I think this is just what we are waiting for-leaders who are going to take the most basic steps to strengthen our country’s core and put the USA back on firm footing.

There are a few good choices this Election Day; my advice is to check with yourself, think about what you would do to rise out of a possible bankruptcy and vote accordingly. One smart choice will lead us to fixing our core. Go out and vote and good luck.

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HappyDeal for big biz. What about the little guy?

Bill Baylis — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 14:16:45 +0000

It’s only been two weeks since the official start of Obamacare, September 23rd and already several companies are granted waivers from the law faster than your last order at the neighborhood fast food drive through window.

McDonalds among a list of other companies such as Aetna and Cigna were given relief from the bill. But I am just wondering how fast the little guy will be able to get a similar deal.

David Whelan of Forbes Health Dollars blog asked “What Does It Take To Get An ObamaCare Waiver?” his response “just ask”. He also has another excellent question: If companies can so easily get waivers to keep selling insurance made illegal by ObamaCare, can individuals apply for waivers to avoid paying the $950 penalty for not buying the right insurance?

Something tells me that the government health plan is not going to be done “your way” and was not really meant to be on the value menu.

Obamacare and fast food does have a few things in common “we will never understand exactly what is in it ” and “we may regret even having it in the first place.”

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