AHI will be exhibiting at the ACC (American College of Cardiology) 2010 Conference. This event is being held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, GA, on March 14th-16th, 2010. Our Booth # is 2667 and we will be demoing Praxis EMR as well as our practice management system Azalea QuickBill. Stop by our booth for a chance to win a iPod Touch. If you will be in the area, please stop by our booth and say hi!

By Jade Bulecza – bio

VALDOSTA, GA (WALB) –The recession hasn’t hurt Valdosta as badly as many Georgia cities, but unemployment there is still up.

A Valdosta State University professor expects that to change slowly this year.

She says there will continue to be weak areas of the economy, but the private sector is picking up.

Some businesses can actually benefit from the recession according to a VSU professor. Enrollment is up at VSU and Valdosta Technical College. Many of the students at VSU are from out of town. That means potential new customers for businesses.

“If you have a business that can tap into that student population it’s going to help you position yourself for that recovery,” said VSU Associate Professor of Economics Cindy Tori.

While some people are out of jobs and the unemployment rate is more than eight percent in the Valdosta area, there is an upside.

The economic forecast for our area shows that now is a good time for businesses to hire. Dr. Tori says there are a large of number of workers available with a wide range of skills.

Businesses like Azalea Health Innovations hire students.

“We started out with four and now we have 13 full-time and part-time,” said Azalea Health Innovations Chief Financial Officer Doug Swords. “We’ve got several VSU students, some VSU graduates so we’ve got a lot of talent here.”

Azalea Health Innovations won the Guardian Bank Business Plan competition in 2008 which included $15,000 in start-up capital and thousands of dollars in in-kind services donated by Valdosta-Lowndes County Chamber of Commerce members. He says he learned a lot through the planning process.

“We had to plan out five years of financial projection,” said Swords. “It really helped us out a lot.”

To enter the business plan competition, a business must be located in Valdosta or Lowndes County and have the potential to hire VSU or Val Tech students.

Dr. Tori also says now is the time for businesses to advertise. For more information on the business plan competition, click here.

Azalea Health Innovations Friends Newsletter – March 2010

IN THIS ISSUE

*Welcome
*AHI’s New Website
*Medical Necessity Checking and Lost Revenue
*Billing Tip – Fee Schedule Analysis
*Meaningful Use Update
*Upcoming Events

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Welcome

Greetings to all of our Azalea Health Innovations friends and thank you for reading our newsletter. As we start rolling into 2010 we look forward to keeping you informed and up to date on the latest in industry trends as well as whats new at Azalea Health Innovations. If you have topics of discussion or subjects you would like to be covered in a future news letter please let us know.

Happy reading…

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AHI’s New Website

We are pleased to announce our new and updated website will launch March 1st, 2010!

Our new site will feature a new Government Incentives Center allowing the medical community to stay up to date on the latest on “meaningful use” and other incentive programs. Also, look for new Client Testimonials, an enhanced Resource Center, valuable software financing options and much much more… www.AzaleaHealth.com.

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Medical Necessity

Many hospitals and medical offices still depend on manual methods for checking medical necessity on claims. Think of the valuable staff time it takes to review claims to make sure ICD-9 diagnosis codes and CPT procedure codes meet medical necessity. If a claim does not meet the requirements then reimbursements will be denied.

Think of this, the HFMA states, “there are 176,000 code pairs that support medical necessity. Only someone with superhuman speed-reading skills and memory could look through all the documents containing the various national and local codes not to mention modifications that are made monthly.”

To read the complete report go to http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m3257/is_10_58/ai_n6274065/?tag=content;col1

Does your software perform medical necessity checks on medical claims data? If you would like to learn more please feel free to contact us.

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Billing Tip – Fee Schedule Analysis

Does your office know how much to expect in reimbursement from each insurance payer? Do you even know where your fee schedules are located for each contracted insurance? If not it may be time to perform a fee schedule analysis for your practice.

It is very important that your practice recoups the full amount of reimbursement for each service or procedure performed. You want your fees to be high enough to capture maximum reimbursement.

Have you noticed an insurance reimburse you at 100% of your gross fee (not 100% of the allowable amount)? If yes then chances are your fees may not be set high enough.

For example, if Insurance Company X’s fee schedule shows $100.00 as the reimbursement amount for a certain CPT code but your gross fee is only $80.00 then you will always miss out on collecting that extra $20.00. We advise a fee schedule anaylsis to be performed on at least a yearly basis.

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Meaningful Use Update

The 60 day public comment period for “meaningful use” is drawing to an end with the final version of what will be the “meaningful use” criteria for physicians and hospitals to be released in March. We will include the updates in next months newsletter.

For the latest up to date information on “meaningful use” link to http://www.cms.hhs.gov/apps/media/press/factsheet.asp?Counter=3564

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Upcoming Events

AHI will be exhibiting and the following conferences in 2010. At each conference we will be having a drawing for a free iPod Touch. If you will be in the area, please stop by our booth and say hi!

ACC (American College of Cardiology) 2010 Conference. This event is being held at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, GA, on March 14th-16th, 2010

CLMA (Clinical Laboratory Management Association) ThinkLab 2010 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada on May 4-5, 2010.

MGMA (Medical Group Management Association) 2010 Conference. This event is being held at the Ernest N. Memorial Convention Center in New Orleans, LA, on October 24th-27th, 2010.

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Thank you!

Azalea Health Innovations, Inc.
100 North Patterson Street
Valdosta, GA 31601
Toll Free: 877-777-7686
Local: 229-269-4620
Toll Free Fax: 866-683-8679
Web: http://www.AzaleaHealth.com
Email: info@azaleahealth.com

Click the links below to stay in touch:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Azalea-Health-Innovations/145238319941?ref=ts

http://twitter.com/azaleahealth

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Azalea Health Innovations will be exhibiting at the 10th Annual HomeTown Health Spring Meeting! This event is being held at Sea Palms Resort on St. Simons Island, GA. Between April 28th – April 30th.