Pharmacy management is best understood, especially when the various processes are handled professionally. The same story stands for a thorough and customized pharmacy billing. Just like other disciplines of healthcare billing, certain billing challenges have been attached to the pharmaceutical companies. But the fact that some drugs and injections are not covered by insurance adds to the complication of pharmacy billing. As a result, expert knowledge is required to understand the efficacy of including or excluding drugs during the pharmacy billing process.
Not only this, pharmacy billing presents a plethora of new and complex challenges with ever-increasing competition that cannot be solved solely through the use of technology. Therefore, it is critical to outsource pharmacy billing to specialists if you want billing functions to be handled with agility and precision while dealing with the common challenges.
Is your profit margin rapidly dwindling? Is the cost of billing about to go through the roof?
Let’s have a look at the challenges that can be encountered in pharmacy medical billing and coding:
Incorrect Patient Identifier Information
Even minor distractions can cause errors when entering patient information into your pharmacy billing system. However, every pharmaceutical provider is aware that insurance companies routinely deny claims for minor errors such as incorrectly spelling a patient’s name or reversing numbers on their date of birth.
There are two approaches to dealing with this issue and preventing it from occurring. The first step is to double-check each entry you make to ensure its accuracy. The second step is to select practice management software that automatically populates the patient bill based on verified information. If you require patients to enter their own information and confirm it with you prior to their first initial evaluation appointment, there is almost no chance of this type of error delaying payment.
Duplicate Billing
Sometimes one of your employees will prepare a pharmacy bill for a patient, and another will do the same thing, unaware that the bill has already been prepared. In that case, there would be a double bill, potentially resulting in double charges for the patient and an irritated customer. Duplication mistakes are common when using manual pharmacy billing and spreadsheet management.
The solution is automation, which can automatically generate a bill and flag duplicates if someone attempts to generate another pharmacy bill for the same pharmaceutical drug provided to the same patient.
Incomplete Information
Another common error is failing to include important information on a claim, such as the patient’s date of birth or the drug name. Even if there is correct information and the patient has coverage, a blank field can result in a denial from the insurance company.
The solution is to scan your claims before submitting them to ensure there is no missing information or blank fields. It’s your best chance to catch errors before they result in a time-consuming denial and resubmission process.
Service Not Covered
Patient insurance coverage may change due to a variety of factors. There may also be restrictions on how many drugs are covered, resulting in paying out of pocket when a patient’s coverage is exhausted. In fact, improper pharmacy billing can cause costly delays and make collecting from the patient more difficult.
The solution is to check the patient’s insurance coverage at each visit. You must ask the patient to verify their insurance while also ensuring that their benefits have not been exhausted.
Missing Documentation
To pay claims, every insurance provider requires documentation. Without it, they may simply deny a claim and return it to you, in which case you must provide the required documentation and resubmit the claim.
The solution is to train your staff to recognize when documentation is required to prove medical necessity. Ideally, your pharmacy billing software should allow you to attach documentation while submitting a claim.
Outsourcing Pharmacy Billing is One-Stop Solution!
All these challenges in your pharmacy medical billing and coding may have a negative impact on your practice’s cash flow. As a result, it is critical to plan ahead of time for all of these challenges and to implement a strategy that will benefit your pharmaceutical company. One of the best ways to deal with all of these challenges is to outsource pharmacy billing services to Info Hub Consultancy Services (ICS), the leading offshore medical billing company. Their professional billing service providers will handle all your pharmacy billing issues and increase your revenue.
