medical billing service

Medical billing is the process of submitting and following up on claims to insurance companies in order to receive payment for services rendered by a healthcare provider. The same process is used for most insurance companies, whether they are private companies or government-owned (see Medicare).

Billing Process

The billing process is an interaction between the provider and the insurance company (payer). It begins with the office visit. After the provider sees the patient, depending on the service provided and the examination, the doctor creates or updates the patient's medical record. This record contains a summary of treatment and demographic information related to the patient. A physician billing
service should let you and your personnel focus on practicing medicine. Upon the first visit, the provider will usually give the patient a diagnosis (or possibly several diagnoses), in order to better coordinate and streamline his/her care.

The treatment, diagnosis, and duration of service combine to determine the procedure code that will be used to bill the insurance. The doctor then either provides this information to a medical coder or other billing specialist. From this, a billing record, either paper (usually on a standardized form called an HCFA, named for the previous name for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services) or electronic, is generated. This form includes the various diagnoses identified by numbers from the current ICD-9 manual.