Eastern Health, one of Melbourne’s largest metropolitan public health services, has integrated its billing systems into one enterprise-wide system through a partnership with PowerHealth.
PowerHealth Power Billing and Revenue Collection (PBRC) currently provides patient coverage across Eastern Health’s emergency department, inpatient and outpatient, theater and prosthetic billing, pharmacy, allied care, transitional care, ambulatory care, pathology, and medical imaging. manages billing for the entire move. and cardiology services.
Apart from setting up a single billing system, these organizations also worked on setting up a mail house integrated with the PBRC, enabling the automated generation of patient communications by SMS, email, or postal mail. A handheld electronic device called PBRC Mobile was distributed to clinicians for billing and recording services.
In addition, PBRC is integrated with health service directory systems to capture clinician directory information and help identify potential unclaimed claims for services. This system is also used for management reporting.
why it matters
Eastern Health operates more than 60 facilities providing more than 1.3 million treatments annually.
A previous review of existing systems and process capabilities found that this healthcare service was not profitable due to the complexity of its processes and systems.
We then transitioned to replacing 16 billing systems with a single, enterprise-wide billing system that simplified the process. This has yielded an economic benefit so far that is 19% higher than predicted.
According to project manager Marina Hocking, tImplementing PBRC has resulted in an improved patient experience, increased revenue generation, and increased operational efficiency. We also helped them quickly transition to remote work during the pandemic.
After completing the implementation, Eastern Health is now working to further improve the maturity of the system and incorporate the use of business reports to enable data-driven decision-making.
the bigger trend
Another Victorian Public Health Service, Albury Wodonga Health also integrated its PBRC solution into its cloud-based PAS. The billing system integration is part of our digital transformation after adopting the DXC Care Suite platform in 2020.
Children’s Hospital Westmead and Peter MacCallum Cancer Center have also previously implemented the same solution.
In other related news, PowerHealth and its partner Telstra Health have launched PowerAnalytics. It is a new digital solution that provides in-depth analytics and benchmarks to identify actionable insights across healthcare operational and financial performance.
