CMS Provider Enrollment is laborious; Consultants can ease the burden!

Let’s be honest, Healthcare is a convoluted mess of rules and regulations. The Affordable Care Act has only made things more challenging. With the recent changes, providers must now enroll in the CMS EHR Incentive Program and VENDORS. At first glance, this may not seem like a challenging process. After all, these are healthcare companies that are frequently dealing with similar regulations on a daily basis. However, as with most things in life, the devil is in the details. CMS provider enrollment can be a time-consuming process for anyone without help from an expert consultant who understands the nuances of healthcare regulations and coding practices. If you have recently received approval to become a new vendor under the CMS incentive program and don’t have much experience with healthcare regulations or coding standards – let our team help you avoid getting buried in red tape!

What is CMS Provider Enrollment?

CMS stands for Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. CMS is the government agency responsible for administering the Medicare program as well as overseeing the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The CMS EHR Incentive Program is a program that encourages health care providers to use certified Electronic Health Record systems. The EHR Incentive Program provides financial incentives to eligible professionals (EPs), eligible hospitals, and critical access hospitals that adopt, implement, upgrade, or demonstrate meaningful use of certified EHR technology. In other words, provider enrollment is the process of applying with CMS to become a certified EHR.

Why is provider enrollment so important?

The CMS EHR Incentive Program offers financial incentives to EPs who adopt, implement, upgrade to, or otherwise demonstrate meaningful use of certified EHR technology. The Incentive Program was created to improve the quality and safety of healthcare while reducing Health care spending. One of the ways the program does this is by facilitating provider enrollment. Providers who enroll in the program and achieve meaningful use of their EHR technology can receive financial incentives for their investment in the program.

How can Consultants Help?

As an industry, healthcare is extremely complex. Every detail, nuance, and peculiarity of the industry has been carefully planned and built upon over the years. New providers attempting to enroll and meet the CMS requirements can become quickly overwhelmed and buried in red tape. On one hand, this is understandable. Healthcare providers are responsible for many lives and they cannot afford to be careless with their data or coding practices. At the same time, there are many regulations that are difficult to understand and are not always applied consistently. The CMS provider enrollment process is extremely complex and it often requires a fair amount of legwork. As such, providers can often benefit from consulting with experts who can help guide them through the process.

How to Find a Good Healthcare Consultant?

Unfortunately, not all healthcare providers are created equal. There are thousands of healthcare companies that employ thousands of healthcare providers. A provider who is familiar with the CMS requirements and has experience with the provider enrollment process can make the process significantly smoother for providers. Another thing to keep in mind is that most providers who have experience with the CMS EHR Incentive Program specialize in a certain field. For example, it wouldn’t make sense for a neurologist to assist a cardiologist with their provider enrollment process. In order to find a good consultant, you should ask providers in your specialty if they have recommendations. It is also helpful to reach out to organizations in your field of expertise and ask them if they have any recommendations.

CMS Site Consultation and Evaluation with written report

Buy Now

Conclusion

As an industry, the healthcare sector has been contending with new regulations since the inception of the CMS EHR Incentive Program. Given the recent changes to the program, providers should expect provider enrollment to be even more challenging in the coming years. Thankfully, there are experts who can help providers navigate the intricacies of the provider enrollment process. These experts can provide guidance, reduce the amount of legwork required, and help providers achieve their goals in the most expedient manner possible. If you are a healthcare provider who is new to the CMS EHR Incentive Program or if you have recently received approval to become a new vendor under the program, you may want to consider consulting with an expert healthcare consultant who can help you through the provider enrollment process.