May 18, 2016 | Instruments & Equipment, Laboratory Instruments & Laboratory Equipment, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Testing
As technologies used by fitness wearables mature, medical laboratories will want to develop ways to access and process the flood of data that will become available
Point-of-care testing and remote patient monitoring are two technologies that could be disruptive to the clinical laboratory industry, particularly if use of these devices was to reduce the volume of patient specimen that are referred to the nation’s large, centralized medical laboratories.
This is one reason why savvy pathologists watch the stream of new products designed to allow athletes and consumers to monitor their fitness and other characteristics of good health. These devices are at the very front of the curve for remote monitoring of an athlete’s performance during training and competition, as well as enabling consumers to track different parameters of their health. What’s a toy for today’s sophisticated consumers could later be easily adopted for clinical diagnostic purposes.
One great example of how swiftly technology advances are changing remote diagnostic monitoring involves heart rate monitors. It wasn’t long ago that even basic heart rate monitors were a pricey purchase for consumers. But thanks to strong interest in gathering healthcare data, costs are dropping. (more…)
Sep 28, 2015 | Coding, Billing, and Collections, Laboratory Instruments & Laboratory Equipment, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Testing
As national health insurers push more risk to hospital systems and medical groups, many hospital administrators become more interested in establishing their own health insurance companies
New modes of provider reimbursement—such as bundled payments and budgeted payments—are motivating hospitals and health systems to reconsider their existing relationships with health insurers. Hospital administrators want to control the dollars they save by improving patient care, instead of allowing insurance companies to capture that money.
To accomplish these goals, more and more hospitals and health systems across the country are making one of three moves:
• Funding their own health plans;
• Partnering with health insurance companies; or,
• Buying health insurance companies.
As this trend gathers momentum, it will put the medical laboratories of hospitals in a much better position to regain access to patients. It can be expected that hospital administrators will include their own clinical laboratories and anatomic pathology providers in their own health insurance provider networks. (more…)
May 26, 2015 | Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Sales and Marketing, Management & Operations
With patient care shifting to outpatient clinics and home-based medical care, clinical laboratory managers should beef up outreach lab testing services
Declining patient volume is shuttering hospitals across the United States as hospitals lose patients to ambulatory care centers and home-based medical care. This trend directly impacts the pathologists and medical technologists who work in the clinical laboratories of these hospitals.
Empty Beds Indicator of Failing Hospitals
Most pathologists are unaware that, between 2008 and 2013, nearly 130 community hospitals closed. That left 4,974 hospitals operating in the United States, according to American Hospital Association (AHA) 2015 Hospital Statistics, which are based on data from the 2013 AHA Annual Survey.
It is no surprise that below-average occupancy rates are a common denominator of most failed hospital, noted the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC). The 14 hospitals that closed in 2013 had an average occupancy rate of 34%. This is lower than the 48% average occupancy rate of the hospital nearest to the closing hospital, MedPAC stated in its March 2015 report to Congress. (more…)
Dec 16, 2013 | Compliance, Legal, and Malpractice, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Managed Care Contracts & Payer Reimbursement, Management & Operations
Across the nation, as many as 500 ACOs are organizing or already delivering clinical services to as many as 43 million Americans
There is no better way to track the progress of accountable care organizations (ACOs) than to monitor a list of the largest ACOs in the United States. Many pathologists and clinical laboratory managers already serve patients who are enrolled in ACOs.
Oliver Wyman, a consulting firm headquartered in New York City, is tracking the development of ACOs in different regions of the nation. It recently published the statistics on the number of ACOs and estimated ACO enrollment.
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Aug 30, 2013 | Coding, Billing, and Collections, Compliance, Legal, and Malpractice, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Managed Care Contracts & Payer Reimbursement
Confusion, unhappiness, and many unresolved issues remain about the way government and private payers are handling claims for molecular diagnostic tests covered by the 114 new CPT codes
Dust is settling from the fiasco triggered by the Medicare program’s failure to be ready on January 1, 2013, to settle molecular diagnostic test claims filed under the 114 new Tier 1 and Tier 2 molecular CPT codes. The damage is not just limited to Medicare test claims, but also involves private health plans that were waiting to let the Medicare program set precedents on coverage and prices for the new molecular test codes.
Many Clinical Laboratories Must Cope With an Unsatisfactory Situation
Although federal Medicare officials and Medicare contractors have scrambled to rectify the situation, even today there is much unhappiness across the clinical laboratory industry about the current state of things. That unhappiness extends to state Medicaid and private payers because many of these payers have been slow to publish coverage guidelines and prices for these new molecular test CPT codes.
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