Case Studies: Education
A large west coast health system recently addressed a common business issue with a bold solution. The central business office (CBO) had combined billing and coding functions and historically had placed higher priority on the billing activities. The coding skill set of the team suffered and, rather than recruit new talent, the health system opted to retrain and certify all 130 members of the CBO staff and raise the skill level of the team.
Tackling the job of assessing skills and developing individual and team education plans required outside help. The health system initially hired a consulting firm to develop and deliver the training. When the consulting firm was unable to adequately staff the training program, the health system turned to HIM industry leader, Precyse Solutions.
The Precyse team quickly mapped out the training needs of each individual and implemented an initial 80 hours of training to the staff. The staff was located in three different places and Precyse’s national team of trainers was able to supply resources for each location. Pleased with the outcome, the health system requested an additional 40 hours of Advanced and Physician E&M coding education and then added a 40-hour Certified Professional Coder (CPC) test prep class.
The proof of any education program lies in the test results. Of the 130 employees who took the CPC exam, 75% passed the test, a full 10% more than the national average of first-time testers. Precyse then redeployed the CPC preparation training for those employees needing to be retested. The retested group achieved a 90% pass rate. In total, 127 of the 130 students successfully completed the training. Following the training, the health system established a new policy that all coders would have to be certified by the AAPCi and would have to pass the CPC exam.
Due to the nationwide shortage of coders, retraining versus recruiting is becoming a key strategy for hospitals. The supply of trained coders is strained and rather than invest time and money on employ-ment searches, hospitals are looking within their own ranks for qualified coding candidates. The flexible, modular training programs together with the sophisticated skills assessment tools offered by Precyse allow institutions to customize their training by individual, while at the same time ensuring consistency of process and procedure across the HIM team.
This large health system can now continue to focus on billing functions. With improved coding talent, claim denials and rejections are down.