Forest Hill Family Health Associates Selects PatientPoint for Real-time Claims Adjudication

National Council of Quality Assurance-recognized patient centered medical home to implement PatientPoint technology, resulting in minimized A/R days and improved cash flow

ORLANDO, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Thomas Ortiz, M.D., founder and medical director of the Forest Hill Family Health Associates, PA, , has selected revenue cycle management technology from PatientPoint™ for his five-practitioner primary care practice in Newark, NJ. Under the terms of the agreement, PatientPoint, a provider of self-service and revenue cycle management applications, will enable the group to conduct real-time claims adjudication with payers and calculate a patient’s out-of-pocket financial responsibility at the time services are rendered.

“As our practice embarks on a comprehensive HIT initiative that includes the utilization of a comprehensive EHR, the use of PatientPoint technology will integrate and enhance our HIT investments for a more sustainable business model and a stronger bottom line”

“To maintain a financially healthy practice, it’s necessary to collect payment from patients at the time of service in addition to finding ways to expedite payments from payers,” Ortiz said. “PatientPoint’s technology will give us the ability to quickly submit claims and secure the information needed to capture patient payments before they leave the office.”

Practices utilizing PatientPoint’s revenue cycle management applications report fewer A/R days, reduced patient bad debt rates and lower billing costs. When used in combination with electronic health records (EHR), practices can further automate and streamline a number of clinical and administrative processes for a paperless, more efficient workflow.

“As our practice embarks on a comprehensive HIT initiative that includes the utilization of a comprehensive EHR, the use of PatientPoint technology will integrate and enhance our HIT investments for a more sustainable business model and a stronger bottom line,” Ortiz added. “As a patient centered medical home, patient case management and clinical data collection will be key to success in a financially reformed healthcare system.”

Forest Hill Family Health Associates is participating in the New Jersey Health Information Technology Extension Center (NJ-HITEC), a regional extension center that will provide resources to assist the practice as it examines EHR processes currently in place against meaningful use requirements. Through this relationship, the practice will also collaborate with PatientPoint on its EHR initiative. After years of serving the healthcare market as an IT vendor, PatientPoint recently expanded its offerings to include consulting services. Earlier this fall, the company was selected as an approved health IT consultant to NJ-HITEC.

“We look forward to working with Dr. Ortiz and his colleagues as they tackle two of the biggest healthcare challenges—achieving meaningful use and maintaining a profitable business,” said Raj Toleti, CEO of PatientPoint. “As we launch the consulting side of our business, we will leverage our thorough knowledge of practice operations from years of experience as a technology vendor. Through our work with hundreds of healthcare organizations, we’ve gained in-depth insight into how these businesses operate, revealing technology strategies that work well and those that don’t. This understanding will help us recommend process redesigns and workflow changes that will ultimately enable Forest Hill Family Health Associates to achieve meaningful use.”

Ortiz is the current president of the New Jersey Academy of Family Physicians and an associate professor of family medicine at New Jersey Medical School, UMDNJ

About PatientPoint™

PatientPoint™ provides self-service solutions and end-to-end billing services that enable physician practices to streamline administrative and clinical workflow, expedite revenue collection, conduct real-time claims adjudication and improve financial performance, including online pre-registration, patient check-in, scheduling, bill payment and mobile charge capture applications. The company also offers health IT consulting services to individual practices and regional extension centers. For more information, visit www.patientpointkiosk.com.