Recently proposed new rules from two agencies of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services are welcome signs of the healthcare industry’s inevitable inclusion with the rest of the consumer-driven U.S. economy. HHS’s rules represent a start, but patients are expecting much more.

Improving the financial dimension of the patient experience wasn’t a lifelong goal for me, and I didn’t start as a result of one single event. In fact, it was something of an accident that I took my career in this direction. But after I found myself on this path, I realized it was a goal to which I would be proud to commit my life. Here’s how...

The increase in patients’ individual financial responsibility poses a serious challenge to hospitals’ billing and collections practices, because institutional payers and individual patients behave in very different ways. Insurance companies and government payers require a lot of data in a structured, standardized process. Patients are much more...

In the first two parts of this series, "Consumerism is the New Ball Game" and "Solving the Patient Pay Challenge" we’ve seen how rising out-of-pocket costs for patients negatively impacts both them and healthcare providers, and how offering payment options can boost patient experience and provider profitability. Along with payment options, many...

4 Best Practices for Patient Responsibility Portfolio Management 

A healthcare provider’s patient accounts receivable is like any financial asset: it has a face value on paper that may not reflect how much money it is actually worth. Regrettably, in many cases as little as 40 cents of every dollar is actually collected, with 52% written off and...

In 2015, nearly a quarter of employees with healthcare coverage had high deductible plans, up from just 4 percent in 2006. That means they’re paying for healthcare the way they pay for everything else … like a real customer. What does that mean for providers?