Rush Medical, R1 join to build innovation lab for rev cycle | Health Data Management
Rush University Medical Center is looking to build an innovation lab for revenue cycle management, hoping to use quality analytics to improve existing processes.
Chicago-based Rush is working to find ways that will help the organization significantly enhance its revenue cycle management performance, improve the patient financial experience and increase the bottom line while improving transparency to help patients better understand payment processes.
Rush and revenue cycle management vendor R1 will combine resources to build the innovation lab, says Gary Long, chief commercial officer at R1. “We will innovate using quality analytics to develop best practices and we will run the revenue cycle operations of Rush and other health systems.”
The innovation lab will focus on delivering value-based care and adopting advanced analytics that Rush will use to educate its self and other healthcare entities to prepare the healthcare workforce of the future.
Price transparency for patients will be a hallmark of the Rush initiative. Long notes. “When we buy things on Amazon or at the airport, we expect no surprises,” he notes.
Consequently, Rush will provide transparency of price before services are delivered so patients can better see how they are being charged, and while R1 will run revenue cycle operations, Rush will continue to maintain control of the revenue cycle, says John Mordach, senior vice president for finance and chief financial officer at Rush.
The partners also will establish a revenue cycle academy to teach best practices, and R1 will sponsor scholarships to help persons of different backgrounds get the skills they need to work in revenue cycle environments.
Rush assessed several revenue cycle management software vendors before choosing R1, Mordach notes. While Rush was looking for a co-management arrangement with a vendor, other firms were only looking for outsourcing opportunities.
“R1 brought technology-enabled innovation to the table that quite honestly the others did not,” Mordach says.