Outsourcing and the 2008 Presidential Elections
Thursday, January 24, 2008
The first week of January 2008, Brown-Wilson Group's Black Book Research Division, global surveyors of the outsourcing and offshoring economic pulse, collected and analyzed the 2008 influence of outsourcing.
Here is the link to the article, http://theblackbookofoutsourcing.com/docs/OutsourcingAndThe2008PrimaryElections.pdf
What is interesting is that over two thirds of Democrats believe that the President has the power to ban outsourcing in the US, and plan to cast their vote with that misconception in mind.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is an Oklahoma based medical outsourcing pioneer and leader with global presence.
Offshore outsourcing has again become a topic of growing national debate as economic recovery has elevated to the platforms of presidential candidates. But this time it is far less sensationalized than in 2004. It is true that American jobs have been lost to outsourcing because of globalization but it is also true that more US jobs are being created in the same process. The unemployment rate is under 5% and for college grads it is only 1.8%. Nonetheless, some presidential hopefuls are finding themselves pointing again towards offshoring as the demise of the American job market.
The first week of January 2008, Brown-Wilson Group's Black Book Research Division, global surveyors of the outsourcing and offshoring economic pulse, collected and analyzed the 2008 influence of outsourcing.
Here is the link to the article, http://theblackbookofoutsourcing.com/docs/OutsourcingAndThe2008PrimaryElections.pdf
What is interesting is that over two thirds of Democrats believe that the President has the power to ban outsourcing in the US, and plan to cast their vote with that misconception in mind.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is an Oklahoma based medical outsourcing pioneer and leader with global presence.
Labels: 2008 elections and outsourcing, medical outsourcing, offshoring
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 5:59 PM
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Common Medical Billing Problems
Monday, December 17, 2007
Whenever there are problems during a medical bill claim it becomes quite embarrassing leading to stress for the client and others. Hence it is best to avoid mistakes right from the beginning itself. Medical billing and collection errors do occur due to oversight or even incompetence. Some of the common mistakes that cause problems in the medical billing process are listed below.
- Bills are confusing and difficult to understand
- Not consistent billing cycle
- Double billing/ overcharges
- Charges for services not given
- Time constraints
- Credit card payment problems
- Not well filed insurance
- Disputed outstanding bills
- Problem with billing network
- Medical billing software problems
- Denial of care to prepaid insurance coverage
- Taking out very old bills
- Denial of care to children of parents with outstanding balances
- Improper collection practice
- Wrong place, person, address
- Balance owed overlooked
- Failure in credit payment
Labels: insurance bill claim Problems, medical billing, Medical Coding, medical outsourcing, medical transcription
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 9:42 PM
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Outsourcing Medical Work
Thursday, December 13, 2007
Medical outsourcing of health sector back office processes like transcription, coding, and billing is growing by the day. Medical outsourcing work groups in offshore Asian countries like India and the Philippines are constantly trained to be conversant in US guidelines and standards and services like medical transcription is delivered on a daily or even a few hours turnaround basis.
In recent years medical outsourcing has taken a different path where people are seen taking flights out of the US to get surgeries done. Expensive heart or spine surgeries from cheaper countries mean savings in tens of thousands of dollars. Look at this 2006 Time magazine article titled "Outsourcing Your Heart" at http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1196429,00.html
One of the main reasons for the high cost of medical expenses in the US has been due to the lack of competition. Countries like India are planning and focusing on their medical tourism industry where patients from around the world will come for getting high quality health services at competitive rates. As India is a developing country development growth in this type of surgery outsourcing has to develop gradually. But when it comes to processes like medical transcription or medical billing India and the Philippines have already become the world's favorite destinations.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription company that offers total outsourcing solutions in all specialities of medical transcription, medical billing, and medical coding.
Outsourcing is the process where a third party (who may be located domestically or in a offshore country) is used to perform a company's in-house work. Outsourcing has many benefits and may involve many different types of activities.
Medical outsourcing of health sector back office processes like transcription, coding, and billing is growing by the day. Medical outsourcing work groups in offshore Asian countries like India and the Philippines are constantly trained to be conversant in US guidelines and standards and services like medical transcription is delivered on a daily or even a few hours turnaround basis.
In recent years medical outsourcing has taken a different path where people are seen taking flights out of the US to get surgeries done. Expensive heart or spine surgeries from cheaper countries mean savings in tens of thousands of dollars. Look at this 2006 Time magazine article titled "Outsourcing Your Heart" at http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1196429,00.html
One of the main reasons for the high cost of medical expenses in the US has been due to the lack of competition. Countries like India are planning and focusing on their medical tourism industry where patients from around the world will come for getting high quality health services at competitive rates. As India is a developing country development growth in this type of surgery outsourcing has to develop gradually. But when it comes to processes like medical transcription or medical billing India and the Philippines have already become the world's favorite destinations.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription company that offers total outsourcing solutions in all specialities of medical transcription, medical billing, and medical coding.
Labels: medical billing, medical outsourcing, medical transcription, medical transcription company
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 6:36 PM
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Medical Billing Career
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Now if you are thinking of becoming a medical billing person, the foremost thing to do is to try and know a bit about the profession, the required skills and abilities and also determine which medical speciality area is preferable to you. It is also essential to know about medical transcription and the medical billing software.
All billing work can be outsourced to professional medical billers who will coordinate between the patient and the health providers/ doctors anytime during the claims process. Transcription work is usually outsourced to some third party who will be from a different location. It is the billing software that links the actual billing and the electronic documents and transcripts that are transcribed from audio recordings by the medical transcriptionist. All health service aspects have specific medical codes. The medical billing personnel must be familiar and also an expert in record keeping. He must also familiarize himself with the various medical codes besides being at ease with various other healthcare standards and certifications.
Medical billing professional can take the CMRS (Certified Medical Reimbursement Specialists) exam which is a voluntary, national credential for the medical billing profession. The CMRS designation is awarded by the Certifying Board of the American Medical Billing Association.For more details go to the AMBA (American Medical Billing Association ) website at, http://www.ambanet.net/AMBA.htm
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription company that offers professional yet affordable services in medical billing, medical transcription and medical coding.
Medical billing is the process of submitting claims to insurance companies and following up to receive the payment for various speciality health services rendered by a health care provider. Medical billing is in itself a specialty area of work and professional medical billers are real experts at claim reimbursements.
Now if you are thinking of becoming a medical billing person, the foremost thing to do is to try and know a bit about the profession, the required skills and abilities and also determine which medical speciality area is preferable to you. It is also essential to know about medical transcription and the medical billing software.
All billing work can be outsourced to professional medical billers who will coordinate between the patient and the health providers/ doctors anytime during the claims process. Transcription work is usually outsourced to some third party who will be from a different location. It is the billing software that links the actual billing and the electronic documents and transcripts that are transcribed from audio recordings by the medical transcriptionist. All health service aspects have specific medical codes. The medical billing personnel must be familiar and also an expert in record keeping. He must also familiarize himself with the various medical codes besides being at ease with various other healthcare standards and certifications.
Medical billing professional can take the CMRS (Certified Medical Reimbursement Specialists) exam which is a voluntary, national credential for the medical billing profession. The CMRS designation is awarded by the Certifying Board of the American Medical Billing Association.For more details go to the AMBA (American Medical Billing Association ) website at, http://www.ambanet.net/AMBA.htm
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription company that offers professional yet affordable services in medical billing, medical transcription and medical coding.
Labels: AMBA, CMRS, medical billing, medical outsourcing, medical transcription
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 10:21 PM
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Medical Transcription and Drug Reference
Medicines and drugs are an integral part of mainstream western allopathic medicines that are consumed around the world. A medical transcription professional who daily transcribes the physician's or any specialist doctor's dictations may come across prescription of drugs both old and new. A medical transcriptionist has to be aware of the latest drugs introduced in the concerned market and this can be done with the following pharmacology (drug) reference books which should always be a part of his library.
- Physician's Desk Reference (PDR)
- American Drug Index (ADI)
- Saunders Pharmaceutical Word Book
- Understanding Pharmacology
While a drug's trade name or brand name is selected for its appeal to prescribing physicians, the generic drug can have several trade names, each copyrighted by different manufacturers. While transcribing drug names these are some of the main factors that should be kept in mind by the transcriptionist.
- Generic names are always in lower case
- Trade names start in capitals and can have internal caps as well
- PDR (Physicians' Desk Reference) is for prescribed drugs
- Separate publication for non prescribed drugs
- Drugs can sound similar but be totally different in spelling and usage
- Do not capitalize words like tablet / capsule / solution / cream etc.
Labels: coding, medical billing, medical outsourcing, medical transcription, MT, PDR
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 8:51 PM
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Medical Outsourcing Services
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Medical outsourcing services offshoring to Asian countries like India has become very convenient for the medical practitioners and professionals. Not only are they free from a lot of hassles but also can save time and money.
What are the assured advantages with medical outsourcing?
Developing countries like India, and then Philippines have the advantage of having a large pool of English speaking graduates who can deliver consistent service with high accuracy levels. Besides medical transcription, some of the other services are billing, claims processing, and coding, as well as remote medical and medical help desk services and amount to two hundred billion dollars a year globally.
Further the advantageous time difference and low wages in these countries make the services very attractive to the average American. Many companies even establish a company branch in the chosen Asian country to get good qualified and inexpensive workers.
A more recent development of medical outsourcing is seen in the area of drug testing where major pharmaceutical companies chose to test their drugs in India because of the availability of enough educated doctors and patient volunteers.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription outsourcing service provider offering cost effective services in medical transcription, medical billing and medical coding.
In the US outsourcing is a popular term and so is globalization. After the popular term BPO (business process outsourcing) it is medical transcription, medical billing and other types of medical outsourcing that are the major outsourcing areas. Outsourcing of non core areas of a business is very beneficial and allows one more time to focus on the more important and core aspects of the business.
Medical outsourcing services offshoring to Asian countries like India has become very convenient for the medical practitioners and professionals. Not only are they free from a lot of hassles but also can save time and money.
What are the assured advantages with medical outsourcing?
- Reduction in cost
- No cutting of services to current clients
- More time for essential work
- Professional/accurate service
- Low turnaround time
- Saving precious time
- Reliable work on time
Developing countries like India, and then Philippines have the advantage of having a large pool of English speaking graduates who can deliver consistent service with high accuracy levels. Besides medical transcription, some of the other services are billing, claims processing, and coding, as well as remote medical and medical help desk services and amount to two hundred billion dollars a year globally.
Further the advantageous time difference and low wages in these countries make the services very attractive to the average American. Many companies even establish a company branch in the chosen Asian country to get good qualified and inexpensive workers.
A more recent development of medical outsourcing is seen in the area of drug testing where major pharmaceutical companies chose to test their drugs in India because of the availability of enough educated doctors and patient volunteers.
Outsource Strategies International (OSI) is a US based medical transcription outsourcing service provider offering cost effective services in medical transcription, medical billing and medical coding.
Labels: coding, medical billing, medical outsourcing, medical transcription, MT, MT Outsourcing
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 10:32 PM
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The Growing Need for Medical Transcription Outsourcing
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Because every time a medical bill is being made there is the possibility that some insurance company is actually paying the bill. So unless we have perfect documentation of the disease the process of diagnosis medicines etc how can the billing be done? And with so much of growth in the volume of health care clients and hospitals /specialties, either a full time transcription team has to be arranged within the hospital premise or the transcription work has to be outsourced. Work is being sent to offshore locations for purely economic and turnaround time reasons. Thus today we have the fully evolved transcription outsourcing industry.
According the United States department of Labor, the world wide demand for medical transcription is set to reach 20 billion dollars. So if looking out for a career in Medical transcription now is a good time. What are basic requirements to become a good medical transcription professional? It is actually quite simple. One must have,
Why it is that medical transcription outsourcing has become a big business today? Well it is just because one thing leads to other. In the earlier days medical secretaries just had to type out the reports dictated by the doctor after the rush time. Now it is different. For one so much more documentation is required and that too in such less time that a secretary will have time for nothing else. It has become mandatory for hospitals to keep digital records of all the patient details. Why?
Because every time a medical bill is being made there is the possibility that some insurance company is actually paying the bill. So unless we have perfect documentation of the disease the process of diagnosis medicines etc how can the billing be done? And with so much of growth in the volume of health care clients and hospitals /specialties, either a full time transcription team has to be arranged within the hospital premise or the transcription work has to be outsourced. Work is being sent to offshore locations for purely economic and turnaround time reasons. Thus today we have the fully evolved transcription outsourcing industry.
According the United States department of Labor, the world wide demand for medical transcription is set to reach 20 billion dollars. So if looking out for a career in Medical transcription now is a good time. What are basic requirements to become a good medical transcription professional? It is actually quite simple. One must have,
- A good knowledge of basic to advanced medical terminologies.
- Good verbal communication and memory skills.
- Ability to be accurate with numbers
- Skill in office equipment/computer.
- Good listening skills
- Good verbal and written comprehension.
- Ability to maintain records
- Above-average typing skills.
- Good grammar/punctuation skill
- Proficiency in certain or multiple medical specialties
Labels: medical outsourcing, medical transcription company, Medical Transcription Company. Medical transcription Services, MT Outsourcing
posted by Outsource Strategies International @ 11:04 PM
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