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Understand the Black Book Research Criteria to Choose the Right Outsourced RCM Services Provider

May 13, 2022

This blog is part of a series. Read Part 1 and Part 3.


As our second blog in this series about the benefits of using Black Book Research’s comprehensive set of assessment criteria to evaluate outsourced revenue cycle management (RCM) service providers, we focus on the measures associated with Security, Compliance, and Trust.

Black Book Research evaluated outsourced diagnostic/laboratory RCM services vendors on 18 different evaluation criteria based on customer feedback through an annual Black Book market research survey. “Diagnostic/Laboratory Support and Revenue Cycle Management Outsourcing” dives into all of these findings.1

The report highlights the advantages of RCM outsourcing while assessing the performance of leading outsourced service providers, but also reveals variability among top vendors in terms of offering and performance.
 
Research participants were asked to rate vendors by using a 10-point scale to answer several specific questions relevant to the Security, Compliance, and Trust category. Three important capabilities were evaluated by Black Book in this category:
  1. Trust, Accountability, Ethics, and Transparency
  2. Data Security, Patient Privacy, and Backup Services
  3. Brand Integrity

To evaluate each vendor on Trust, Accountability, Ethics, and Transparency, survey participants scored vendors on the following statements:

“Trust in enterprise reputation is important to clients as well as prospects.”


“Client possesses an understanding that its vendor organization has the people, processes, and resources to effectively deliver the desired business and clinical results, based on its industry reputation and past.”

On these criteria, the top three RCM vendors scored an average rating of 9.30 out of 10 overall, 20% higher than the mean for all vendors, and over 50% higher than the mean for bottom-ranked vendors. Two of the three RCM vendors also found themselves within the top three in the assessment of Data Security, Patient Privacy, and Backup Services, demonstrating a high degree of correlation between these categories.

To assess Data Security, Patient Privacy, and Backup Services, survey respondents were asked to evaluate vendors on the following:

“In order to provide secure and constantly dependable outsourced service offerings for physician and hospital/IDN affiliate practices and entities, a contract services vendor has to provide the highest level of security and data backup services.”


“Vendor’s service in these two areas is superior to the security and backup system of past internal systems.”

On these factors, the top three RCM vendors tallied an average rating of 9.46 out of 10, whereas the bottom three scored an average 7.05. The highest score was a 9.6, while the lowest score was nearly half that, at 5.92. Hospitals and health systems and pathology practices expressed slightly higher satisfaction on average than other segments.

Likewise, to evaluate Brand Integrity, survey responders assessed the following:

“Outsourcing vendor’s marketing and sales statements/pitches are accurately and appropriately represented by actual product and service deliverables.”


“Image is consistent with top patient satisfaction rankings.”


“Sales presentations and proposals are delivered upon and corporate integrity/honesty in marketing and business development are highly valued.”


“Company image and integrity are values upheld top-down consistently.”

This category elicited varied scores, going from a 9.25 average for the top three vendors to an average 5.07 for the bottom three. Pathology practices were both slightly happier than average with top performers, and slightly less satisfied than average with bottom performers than other segments.

The Black Book Research team makes it clear that decision-makers can rely on objective peer assessments to benchmark current vendor performance and identify best-in-class capabilities for outsourcing revenue cycle management. How does your RCM vendor stack up? Access the full report for detailed rankings.

View Full Report


BLACK BOOK™ TOP OUTSOURCED LABORATORY REVENUE CYCLE MANAGEMENT VENDORSBlack Book Research, LLC, Survey Period: Q4 2020 – Q3 2021 | Published: October 2021

Revenue Cycle ManagementComplianceArtificial IntelligenceFinancial ReportingBusiness Intelligence

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