What does a medical billing and coding personnel do? Why is it that this job is very much the trend and in demand nowadays? For one, hospitals, private doctors, insurance companies – for their insurance programs like Medicare and Medicaid, community hospitals, medical outsource companies, nursing caregiver facilities Faster Claims Turnaround; home health care, long term and outpatient care facilities, etc. greatly need the expertise of somebody to efficiently perform medical billing and coding for them.
There are lots of employment opportunities for those with this kind of expertise. You will not be surprised to find yourself working with private lawyers helping out with the claims of patients of their clients, the hospitals, private clinics and even rehab and physical therapy facilities. If you are seriously inclined to engage in this field, you can be both the employer and employee coder/biller from the comfort of your home armed with a top-of-the-line computer, high tech software and internet access.
Usual job openings are as medical billing specialist, in patient or outpatient coder, billing clerk, billing associate, senior claims operation associate and many more. As a billing specialist, you must have at least a one year hands-on experience and knowledge of the latest coding software. Your responsibility is the procedural and diagnostical coding of every patient case, supervision of accounts receivable and patients’ statements of accounts.
For the job of a billing associate, you should have at least finished High School or possess a GED equivalent and must have at least 2-3 years experience in medical billing. You must have technical knowledge with computers and skills with MS Excel, EMR, electronic claims, billing procedures and revenue monitoring.
If you are after the position of an outpatient coding specialist, you should have finished High School or GED with at least one certification as a Certified Coding Specialist (CCS), Registered Health Information Administrator (RHIA) or Registered Health Information Technician (RHIT). In addition, a three years coding experience in ICD-9-CM, DRGs, and CPT/HCPCS, including modifiers and APCs are necessary.
Let us go into details with what your job as a Corporate Outpatient Coding Specialist will be. You are to coordinate with the Health Information Management group to provide outpatient surgery coding support. Assignment of accurate diagnostic and procedural codes with ICD-9-CM and CPT / HCPCS (3M coding software), and appropriate references is your main responsibility. Another important work is the centralization of a coding system for CHS hospitals through scanned medical records and abstracts by way of access to hospital abstracting systems. In addition, you will be making independent decisions regarding accurate code assignments. The decisions you make will determine the formulation of appropriate company policy, reimbursement viability of CHS and corporate compliance with regulatory requirements for an accurate billing strategy.
When it comes to a senior claims operations associate job, you should have a High School diploma, at least 2-3 years experience in Medicare Part A and B claims processing and medical billing, knowledge in medical coding like CPT, HCPC, ICD9 and DRG. Your job is data entry, review and process, and monitor and log production of error free claims.
Having a bachelor or postgraduate degree, proven track record experience, updated knowledge and technical skills with the latest technology coding, certification from the American Medical Billing Association are your plus factor credentials. This is the reality of the supply and demand free market. A medical billing and coding job is trendy and much in demand nowadays! If you are competent, a very bright future awaits you with a competitive compensation and bonus packages as well as a fantastic professional development career with the way things are shaping up in the medical industry!