What Are Medical Billing Services?

Medical billing service is defined as the process of submitting claims to insurance companies or the United States government agency, Medicare. This process ensures that hospitals and doctors receive payment for the medical services they provide their patients.

How does the medical billing process work? The medical billing process itself is quite simple; the doctor examines the patient, and gives his diagnosis. Then either the physician or his staff records the diagnosis as well as the treatment given to the patient.

The advent of computers, customized and detailed medical billing software, has resulted in the process becoming even more accurate and efficient.

In the past medical billing records generated long paper trails. Then and now, the process of filing medical insurance claims is constantly changing. Altogether, it created a situation where medical billing was made inaccurate. This resulted in a lot of unpaid and fraudulent claims.

In today’s updated electronic medical billing services process, the doctor provides patient information to a medical coder. The medical coder then creates a medical billing record, by the use of the coding system provided by WHO.

The next new step is that the medical billing record will go either to a clearing house that acts as an intermediary for the medical billing record, or directly to the insurance company.
Another beneficial change is that the medical billing process, which used to be the sole function of the hospitals and physicians, is now being outsourced, to growing numbers of small and home based business firms.

Today’s medical billing services firms are not simple data entry business. They handle more than just the record keeping aspects, by directly dealing with the insurance companies and the medical billings claims with a high degree of accuracy.

View all Articles by: Melissa Clark, CCS-P