5 Ways to Promote Compassionate Patient Collections in Your Revenue Cycle

Today’s healthcare organizations face countless challenges in terms of achieving financial sustainability. Increased Medicare Advantage claim denials, annual Medicare payment cuts, and ongoing commercial payer coverage restrictions are just a few examples. What’s one of the most significant challenges that plague all providers regardless of their payer mix?

Patient collections.

Let’s face it. Self-pay collections have never been an easy topic. Healthcare organizations are in the business of helping people, and many providers minimize the financial component to doing that. However, over time—and with the increase of high deductible health plans—patients themselves are increasingly responsible for all or a substantial portion of the medical bill. This increase in the patient financial responsibility and trend toward ‘patients as payers’ continues to exacerbate long-standing patient collection challenges.

In addition, millions of Medicaid beneficiaries lost their benefits during recent Medicaid redeterminations. While many of these individuals may be eligible for tax credits to offset the cost of Marketplace coverage, others may not. Regardless of coverage, many Americans continue to struggle with the ability to pay for healthcare services they need, according to a recent survey. This same survey found that 30% of adults with employer coverage were paying off debt from medical or dental care, as were 33% of those in marketplace or individual-market plans, 21% with Medicaid, and 33% with Medicare.

Not surprisingly, individuals with medical debt are much more financially vulnerable across a range of financial measures, a recent study found. For example, adults with medical debt are less likely than those without medical debt to have some form of savings account and are more likely to overdraw their checking account or make late payments on their student loans. Adults with medical debt are also more likely to delay or forgo needed medical care due to cost. This makes financial conversations particularly difficult and sensitive.

While some healthcare organizations may have collections strategies that work well with payers, these same strategies almost never work with patients. To improve patient collections and overall revenue cycle management, providers must follow best practices and take a novel approach centered on empathy, compassion, and world-class customer service.

Here are five ways to promote compassionate collections:

1. Pay attention to tone when discussing patient financial responsibility. The tone of the conversation can make or break the effort to collect the balance owed. Using a respectful, friendly tone is paramount. So is referring to the patient by their first name as frequently as possible. Remember: Patients ultimately want to feel heard, understood, and validated.

2. Build rapport. In addition to using a positive tone, it’s also important to try and connect with patients in some way before attempting to collect any money. It could be something as simple as asking them how they’re doing, what the weather is like that day, or whether they enjoy living in their home state. Compassionate patient collections is about making the patient feel comfortable and open to a more in-depth conversation about healthcare costs.

3. Communicate with patients in their native language. Compassionate collections relies on a foundation of empathy and trust that’s difficult to achieve when there are communication barriers. Communicating in the patient’s native language puts patients at ease so they can ask questions about the medical bill without feeling self-conscious and express themselves fully during difficult financial conversations. Collection specialists can leverage the information patients provide to find solutions that are the best fit for an individual’s specific financial circumstances.

4. Be prepared to explain the medical bill in plain language. Patients are more likely to pay their medical bill when they understand what the healthcare organization charged and why. Even despite the No Surprises Act aimed to increase price transparency, most medical bills are confusing at best. In addition, 30% of consumers continue to receive medical bills they don’t even expect. Developing a patient-friendly financial statement is critical; however, many patients may still have questions about the amount they owe. Compassionate collections specialists welcome these questions and answer them in a clear, concise, and nonargumentative way. Active listening is important. This means specialists allow patients to ask questions and voice concerns and then repeat that information back to them before proceeding with answers and potential solutions.

For example, a patient may say, ‘I thought I already met my deductible. Why do I owe $100 for this visit?’ The specialist can respond as follows: ‘I understand you have questions about your deductible, and I want to help you and provide the information you need so you understand your bill.’

5. Evaluate patients for financial assistance. Compassionate patient collection strategies include options for financial assistance. Collection specialists must be adept at discussing patient payment plans and charitable care according to the facility’s policies. This includes walking patients through the application process and explaining what financial information may be required. These conversations can be difficult and highly emotional—particularly if patients are unemployed or underemployed—and it’s important for collection specialists to be able to navigate them with respect and sensitivity.

Outsource considerations for patient payment services

It may make financial and operational sense to partner with an outsource vendor specializing in patient payment services that can serve as an extension of your revenue cycle management team to focus solely on patient accounts receivable. Compassionate collections is a customer service skill that takes time and training to develop, and not every healthcare organization has the luxury of possessing the right in-house expertise. In the spirit of improving the patient financial experience and promoting financial sustainability, an outsource partnership may be the best option. Learn how Inland RCM can help.