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chloeharper2187 · 3 years ago

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Medical Billing Challenges Faced by Dermatologists

It’s not rocket science to prove that dermatology is one of the most complex medical specialties as it is a multi-faceted specialization. For example, dermatological procedures can range from simplistic cosmetic surgeries to more complicated skin grafting that must be reflected in the medical billing. Therefore, this is what makes medical billing a complicated process for dermatological practice. Moreover, dermatologists usually handle more patients than physicians in other specialties. Hence, to address the large volume of the patient, the medical billing and coding should be as accurate as possible so that you receive proper reimbursement.

This article will get more insight into dermatological billing and coding challenges and how you can streamline your dermatological billing processes to make them more efficient and quicker.

Different coding systems

Coding systems are essential for both the physicians and the insurance payers as they indicate the procedure performed based on which the reimbursement is provided. Usually, the insurance providers use the ICD (The International Classification of Diseases) and the CPT (Current Procedural Terminology) codes for dermatological billing and coding.

Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) sets ICD-10-CM as the standard transaction code for diagnostic purposes. Moreover, this transaction code is used for tracking the numerous health care statistics/ disease burden, mortality statistics, quality outcomes, and billing. ICD-10 diagnosis codes are more detailed and usually begin with an alpha character with typically 3 to 7 characters in length.

All inpatient and outpatient procedures and services in medical practice are indicated with the CPT codes. In fact, many of these codes are used by the in-house dermatological practices for billing purposes such as skin biopsies, Mohs surgery, and excision. Also, there are Evaluation and Management (E/M) codes within the CPT coding system used for the billing of an inpatient or an office visit appropriately.

Documentation Challenges

All types of medical billing documentation must be completely accurate as they can also be considered a legal document justifying the services rendered to the patients or the reasons for such services and alike. Such medical documentations also serve the purpose of evidence in front of the honorable court of law. Moreover, it is an essential source for accurate reimbursement for the procedures performed.

However, there are numerous modifiers to be used in the medical documentation of dermatological practices. But, 59 modifier is the most used code as the other related modifiers are not well understood. Therefore, many dermatological physicians have faced multiple issues with the medical documentation and the use of modifiers in the E/M and dermatology procedures.

Outdated patient records

Many dermatologists are often unable to fetch the latest insurance information from their patients. However, the administrative medical billing team usually gets in touch with the correct insurance payer to avoid any kind of claim denials. Therefore, it is essential to take some time out to check all the insurance information before providing any kind of dermatological services. This will save your months of unpaid claims time.

Dermatology Medical Billing Compliance

Lack of proper billing knowledge can lead to the overuse of modifiers 25 and 59. On the one hand, 25 modifiers are defined as “significant, separately identifiable evaluation and management (E/M) service on the same day of the procedure or other service by the same physician.” In contrast, modifier 59 is defined as a District Procedural Service (DPS). Under certain situations, it may be required to indicate that a service or procedure was independent and distinct from other non- evaluation and management (E/M) services performed on the same day.

As per an article in Dermatology Times, approximately 60% of E/M services performed by dermatologists are submitted with modifier 25. Of the remaining services, around 25% are coded as “for the rest of medicine.” Therefore, it indicates that any amendment in the modifier 25 payment policy will directly impact dermatology practices more than any other specialties.

Conclusion

With the stringent compliance standards to uphold and recent billing changes, dermatology practices can save a lot of time and effort. However, for realizing your true revenue earning potential, you must first prioritize a responsible and achievable plan for the financial strategies of your practice. One such feasible plan is to outsource your dermatology medical billing to 24/7 Medical Billing Services. By outsourcing the dermatology medical billing, you can expect the most efficient and accurate bill processing from the experts that know their jobs very well. In addition, our dermatology billing services can give you the expertise that your practice needs to grow and thrive in this medical landscape.

About 24/7 Medical Billing Services:

We are a medical billing company that offers ‘24/7 Medical Billing Services’ and support physicians, hospitals, medical institutions and group practices with our end to end medical billing solutions. We help you earn more revenue with our quick and affordable services. Our customized Revenue Cycle Management (RCM) solutions allow physicians to attract additional revenue and reduce administrative burden or losses. Contact: 24/7 Medical Billing Services Tel: +1 888-502-0537 Email: [email protected]

#Medical Billing for Dermatology #Dermatology Billing Services Outsourcing #Dermatology Billing Services in Florida #Dermatology Billing Services in Texas #Dermatology Billing Services in NewYork #Dermatology Billing Services in Michigan #Dermatology Billing Services in Pennsylvania #Dermatology Billing Services in California #Dermatology Billing Services in Georgia

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rodgo23 · 5 years ago

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Bill Gates and Intellectual Ventures Funds Microchip Implant Vaccine Technology

Posted on: Tuesday, April 14th 2020 at 5:30 am

Written By: Celeste McGovern

This article is copyrighted by GreenMedInfo LLC, 2020

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The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has donated more than $21 million towards developing a vaccine technology that uses a tattoo-like mechanism which injects invisible nanoparticles under the skin that is now being tested in a vaccine against the virus that causes COVID-19.

The microneedle technology is also being wed to injectable technology, funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which embeds under the skin a vaccination record visible by near infrared light that can be read by smartphone technology.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is funding the technologies with aims to enable them in “house-to-house” vaccine campaigns undertaken by people with “minimal training.”

Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh reported in their study published April 1 in EBiomedicine, a Lancet Journal, that their microneedle patch vaccine against the SARS CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 “prompted robust antibody production in the mice within two weeks.”

The patches resemble a spiky piece of Velcro, with hundreds of tiny microneedles made of sugar. The needles prick just into the skin and quickly dissolve, releasing the vaccine into the tiny abrasions and inducing a potent immune cell response despite the minute amount of the vaccine material – far more potent than an intramuscular injection.

The researchers had been testing vaccine using the microneedle patch for other coronaviruses, including the one that causes Middle East Respiratory System (MERS) and reported that three different experimental MERS vaccines induced the production of antibodies against the virus. These responses were stronger than the responses generated by regular injection of one of the vaccines along with a powerful immune stimulant (an adjuvant). Antibody levels continued to increase over time in mice vaccinated by microneedle patch—up to 55 weeks, when the experiments ended. The researchers have now turned their technology to the COVID-19 virus, SARS CoV-2.

“Testing in patients would typically require at least a year and probably longer,” senior co-author of the study, dermatology professor Louis Falo said. “This particular situation is different from anything we’ve ever seen, so we don’t know how long the clinical development process will take. Recently announced revisions to the normal processes suggest we may be able to advance this faster.”

Another study funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and published in December, 2019 by researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Institute of Chemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing and the Global Good, Intellectual Ventures Laboratory in Bellevue, WA, describes how “near-infrared quantum dots” can be implanted under the skin along with a vaccine to encode information for “decentralized data storage and bio-sensing.”

“To maximize the utility of this technology for vaccination campaigns, we aimed to create a platform compatible with microneedle-delivered vaccines that could reliably encode data on an individual for at least five years after administration,” said the MIT paper, titled Biocompatible near-infrared quantum dots delivered to the skin by microneedle patches record vaccination. “In addition, this system also needed to be highly biocompatible, deliver a sufficient amount of dye after an application time of 2 min or less, and be detectable using a minimally adapted smartphone.”

Fridrik Laurusson, an author of the microchip study, is from The Global Good, Intellectual Ventures Labarotory. Its website features Microsoft founder Bill Gates on its front page and describes itself as a “collaboration between Bill Gates and Intellectual Ventures” a company founded by Nathan Myhrvold and Edward Jung of Microsoft. Wikipedia describes Intellectual Ventures in Gates’ home state as a private American company that “centers on the development and licensing of intellectual property” and “one of the top-five owners of U.S. patents, as of 2011.

“Its business model has a focus on buying patents and aggregating them into a large patent portfolio and licensing these patents to third parties,” according to Wikipedia. The company has been described as the country's largest and most notorious patent trolling company, the ultimate patent troll, and the most hated company in tech.

The company has been described as the country's largest and most notorious patent trolling company,[2] the ultimate patent troll[3], and the most hated company in tech.[4]

The website of the Bill and Melinda Gates lists multiple grants awarded to develop the “microneedle array patch” – for use in “house-to-house campaigns via administration by minimally-trained personnel.”

The most recent grant for $370,035 was awarded in February, 2020 to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for an MMR vaccine patch that does not require refrigeration and “enables house-to-house campaigns” via people without medical experience or training.

Bill Gates has awarded much larger grants for microneedle array patch technology to companies and organizations including:

* Vaxxas Pty Ltd in Brisbane, Queensland ($4.99 million in November, 2019) to develop a “microneedle array patch for measles and rubella vaccination that enables house-to-house campaigns via administration by minimally-trained personnel”

Vaxxas was created in 2011 after Mark Kendall's research group at the University of Queensland commercialized the nanotechnology under the company, UniQuest. The company has raised more than $35 million for the nanotechnology. It’s partnered with vaccine manufacturer Merck – a company whose drug Vioxx caused more than 27,000 deaths by heart attack before the company revealed the risks it had hidden from the public. Merck has repeatedly been accused by judges for “egregious” ethical breaches and of “improper testing and data falsification” on its Gardasil HPV and MMR vaccines. Merck made

Micron Biomedical Inc ($6,744,906 in November, 2019) “to develop a microneedle array patch for measles and rubella vaccination that enables house-to-house campaigns via administration by minimally-trained personnel”

Georgia Institute of Technology ($958,849 in December, 2019) “to develop a microneedle array patch for measles and rubella vaccination that enables house-to-house campaigns via administration by minimally-trained personnel”

Vaxess Inc, ($2,967,741 in November, 2016) in Boston, MA “to support the preclinical development and manufacture of a thermostable microneedle patch with the aim of lowering barriers to vaccine access by simplifying dosing and administration, alleviating cold chain constraints, and lowering costs

Cardiff University ($$3,570,376 in December, 2019) “to develop a dissolvable microneedle array patch for the sustained dermal delivery of a progestin contraceptive, including the conduct of preclinical proof of concept studies”

Gates began funding the implantable biotechnology back in 2011 via a small ($100,000) grant to the Santa Cruz based company TransDerm Inc whose Linkedin page links to a website for the pharmaceutical giant Allergan.

Last month Reuters news service reported – falsely -- that a popular Facebook post about Bill Gates planning to use microchip implants to fight the coronavirus pandemic was a “false claim.” The news service linked to the censored Facebook post.

Gates, whose father was the director of Planned Parenthood Federation of America and mother worked for PPFA’s funding affiliate United Way, has been noted for his population control ideology. His wife, Melinda Gates, launched a Family Planning Summit on World Population Day in 2012 with the aim of garnering tax dollars from governments to expand reproductive health services aimed at lowering the global birth rate.

Difficult questions about vaccines are on BOTH sides of this huge debate. Find out the pros and cons and get the knowledge to make your own informed decision. Don't miss The Truth About Vaccines happening April 22-30.

Celeste McGovern is an award-winning independent journalist in Scotland. She reports on medical news, drug scandals, alternative health and more at www.ghostshipmedia.com.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of GreenMedInfo or its staff.