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- Mar 30, 2003
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Like most of you, our practice is increasingly burdened with prior-auth requirements.
It sucks, but it's one thing when you are getting prior auth for a procedure you will be paid to do. It's entirely another when I have a staff member spending 20-30 minutes on the phone to get an MRI authorized for which we will be paid nothing, and someone else will make hundreds to thousands. When you translate staff time into our cost, we're looking at spending probably $15-20 per MRI for prior auth. The only reason we tolerate this is that these are sunk costs. I'm already paying these staff members to be in the office and do other work. But it takes away from more productive and rewarding work.
Do any of you have a more creative approach to this problem?
Do any of you outsource prior-auths? There are companies that say they can do all the legwork for you at a reasonable cost.
Do any of you push it all back on the patient?
It sucks, but it's one thing when you are getting prior auth for a procedure you will be paid to do. It's entirely another when I have a staff member spending 20-30 minutes on the phone to get an MRI authorized for which we will be paid nothing, and someone else will make hundreds to thousands. When you translate staff time into our cost, we're looking at spending probably $15-20 per MRI for prior auth. The only reason we tolerate this is that these are sunk costs. I'm already paying these staff members to be in the office and do other work. But it takes away from more productive and rewarding work.
Do any of you have a more creative approach to this problem?
Do any of you outsource prior-auths? There are companies that say they can do all the legwork for you at a reasonable cost.
Do any of you push it all back on the patient?