Kats Chiropractic Consultants CHIROpulse

171 Are you verifying Chiropractic Benefits?

• Marisa Mateja

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Welcome to the KC CHIROpulse Podcast.  

This week’s topic: Verifying Chiropractic Benefits

The KC CHIROpulse Podcast is designed for Chiropractic professionals ready to elevate their practice to new heights and is hosted by Kats Consultants CEO - Dr Michael Perusich and billing expert Sara Colby-Amburgey, both seasoned experts in Chiropractic care and business development.  This podcast provides invaluable insights and actionable strategies to help you create a flourishing and sustainable Chiropractic business.

In this episode, we discuss:

  • Why insurance verifications are so important
  • How verifications can help you collect more money
  • Why verifications are done properly help you follow the insurance rules better
  • How simple insurance verifications can be
  • How to get your patients on board with verifying their benefits
  • …and so much more…

In each episode of KC CHIROpulse, we delve into crucial aspects of building a successful Chiropractic practice, covering topics such as establishing a strong foundation, adopting a patient-centric approach, mastering marketing techniques, achieving financial fitness, fostering effective team building and leadership, integrating technology and innovation, and navigating common challenges in the field.

Whether you're a seasoned chiropractor or just starting your practice, the KC CHIROpulse Podcast offers a wealth of knowledge and practical advice to help you navigate the intricate world of Chiropractic business. Join us on this journey as we explore proven strategies, share success stories, and connect with industry experts to empower you in your pursuit of building a thriving Chiropractic practice.

Don't miss out on the latest insights and expert guidance. Subscribe now and unlock the secrets to taking your Chiropractic practice to the next level. Your success is our priority at Kats Chiropractic Business Advisors.



DISCLAIMER:  The information presented in this broadcast is for educational purposes only and is not intended to offer legal, investment, accounting, or medical advice.  Seek the consultation of a professional for advice in those areas. And remember…your results using this information may be different than described.



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KC CHIROpulse Podcast. Helping Chiropractors keep their pulse on success. Thanks for listening.



Dr. Michael Perusich:

Doctors, are you verifying patient's insurance? Hi, everybody. Welcome to the KC ChiroPulse podcast brought to you by Kats Consultants and ChiroHealth USA. I'm Dr. Michael Perusich. I'm your host today, and I'm joined by my good friend, Sarah Amburgey. Did I say it right? Amber, see, I always, so Sarah and I've known each other, everybody we've known each other for longer than I'm going to say, right? Because I don't want to date both of us, but and so I always want to call her by her maiden name still. So it's, I don't know if that's a good habit or a bad habit. It's a bad habit because you're married to a great guy anyway, Sarah, tell us a little bit about yourself. Cause I want to dive into this whole thing. thing about insurance billing and whether or not we should be verifying insurance benefits. And anyway, I'll stop talking. Tell us about

Sara Amburgey:

you. Thank you. Thanks for having me back again. I love doing these with you. Sarah Colby, Amber, I think everybody knows me as Colby in the chiropractic industry, which you're right. I have a fabulous husband, Amber. That's right. So I have been working in chiropractic care for 27 years, I started my, I started in chiropractic in Oklahoma, moved to an office in Arizona. I've done single doctor practice, multi discipline, multi location. In Oklahoma, we could take x rays. So I've taken x rays all the way to clean and toilets. I've done it all and the chiropractic office. I'm super grateful to be here and loving my chiropractic life and where it's brought me all these years.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

I love it. I love it. And everybody out there, I can tell you for a fact that Sarah is just this incredible wealth of knowledge when it comes to running a chiropractic practice. And she's one of the best experts I think in the profession on billing and insurance and all those great things that we as doctors just don't even like to talk about, but it's necessary.

Sara Amburgey:

That's right. You guys were not made to be insurance gurus. You guys are made to heal people and you want nothing to do with it, but it's so important. It's

Dr. Michael Perusich:

so important. I try and trust me. I was not born to read an EOB. That's why we put good people around us. Thank you, Marisa. So anyway, I want to talk about, so we hear from a lot of doctors who have, for whatever reason and some of them, I think, Kind of at least sound like valid reasons have stopped verifying insurance. And I know you and I've had this conversation of how important is it to be verifying patients insurance benefits?

Sara Amburgey:

It's everything really. And it's a pain on the wall to see, let's just admit it. It's not fun, but it is so necessary. Here's what I think about it is if we don't do the work upfront, we're doing 3 times, 4 times the work on the back end when there's no insurance there meaning somebody could be come in today and have insurance coverage, or you saw them 2 months ago and they had insurance coverage and they don't have it today. Innocently slips their mind to tell you, oh, my husband changed jobs. How am I? I lost my job last week, so I don't have coverage anymore. Not to say that you should verify insurance benefits every visit. That's not logical. But I do think, especially let's talk about October when the insurance enrollment starts, start happening for say, start grabbing those new insurance cards at that time. Find out the effective dates of those new policies.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Okay. Hold on. Hold on right there real quick. Cause you bring up a great point. Cause so many practices wait until January 1st to start asking about new insurance cards. And really you could be 90 days behind at that point.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. That's exactly right. So October is when you guys all know we start seeing the commercials on TV. Especially with the Medicare, but that's also open enrollment for employers as well. So we see it advertised for insurance. Now, of course, you're going to have those plans that are plan year versus calendar year plan years are typically going to be teachers, something like that, where they go on a plan year versus a calendar year. So you have to be aware of those as well, but also When you see those commercials start happening, we all know Medicare enrollments happening because they bombard us. So that's your cue right there. Start asking for new insurance cards. Here's the thing, the mistake that I see in the offices make. Hey Sally, great to see you. Have your insurance changed? No, not the question to ask, but their insurance may not have changed, but guess what they got any plan. So if their plan changed, their group number could change their ID number could change. So there's so many, we cannot ask then through the same thing holds through up through, through March. We've got to be asking their insurance cards because guess what? Going back to Medicare again, those plans can change. They have the opportunity, especially if they enrolled in an advantage plan, they had the opportunity to change advantage plans 1 time. And that process, so it's important that we ask him my typical role of them is if we haven't seen a patient in a couple of months. Ask them for a copy of their insurance card. Hey, it's great to see you, Sally. I need to get a copy of that insurance card. No big deal. It's not a big deal to them. Guess what? When they go into their medical office, they give it every single time every time. Every time chiropractic is different. And so we just don't create those habits that we probably should. And it's super important.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Yeah, for sure. It at least if they haven't been in a while, like you said as a reactivation if they're starting over as a new patient because it's been three years or longer, always get that card. It should just be an automatic thing because they do change. Yeah. And they changed dramatically sometimes,

Sara Amburgey:

even if they have the same insurance, it can change dramatically because they've opted for a different plan. And, life happens. Life happens fast. Things change. And that's why I feel like that each office should set up a rule of thumb if we haven't seen the patient in 2 months, if we haven't seen the patient in 3 months, get a copy of the insurance card because you don't know. And some of those plans, we still have to file on paper. Very few of them, very few of them, but if we're not filing daily. If we file weekly or for an office that still files monthly, you've given your patient a huge grace period in there to be treated for free, essentially, because you're not collecting properly from them because you don't know their insurance verification.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Yeah, which is scary, really, especially when you talk about your cash flow.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. Which is so important. We've got to keep the doors open. We're going to help as many people as we can and keep the doors open.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Cause I'm pretty sure most of us are supposed to be, not supposed to be for profit businesses. That's the idea. I love it. So we're going to take a quick break. Cause we've got to hear a word from our sponsors, but when we come back, Sarah, I want to talk a little bit about some of the pitfalls, additional pitfalls of not verifying insurance. And then I want to dive into. Just the whole billing structure and things in our chiropractic practices and some of the better habits we could develop. So we'll we'll be right back. We're talking about whether or not you should be verifying insurance and all the things that go in with billing insurance. So we'll be right back.

So we all feel it. Rent, or dining out, gasoline, or movies. As a matter of fact, the dollar is not going as far for a whole host of reasons. And it's impacting everybody, regardless of your financial situation. Did you know that 38 percent of the overall population is having to reconsider How they're spending their money just to afford the health care they need. And if you break it down further, 26 percent have actually delayed the health care that they need, including going to see you, the chiropractor. So here's what we need to know about the breakdown in demographics. You would think that That someone who's making 120, 000 or more would be continuing their care right now. But the actual number is 18%, 18 percent of that group is actually putting off healthcare. And that's a group of people making six figures. When you take that same information all the way down to a group making 40, 000, that number is much higher. It's closer to 40%. So it's never been more important than now to make sure you've made it easy for your patients to come see you. That you have choices for them, and you understand what they're going through at home. We want to make sure your practice thrives during this time, and we encourage you to learn about what ChiroHealth USA can do for you, and your practice, and making it easy for patients to see you and continue care.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

All right, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast brought to you by Kats consultants and Chiro health USA. We're here with Sarah today, and we're talking about, by the way, Sarah's the expert in all this stuff. We're talking about. Verifying insurance and all the components of well, maybe not all the components, but a lot of the components of just building to insurance and where we can get in trouble and some of the bad habits that we create. So I want to pick back up on the insurance verification component because. When we don't verify insurance, we talked about the fact that, you could be letting your patient off for free. I'm not real sure how you even do like your good faith estimates and those kind of things if you're doing those. And, but the other side of it is, there's one thing that I see a lot of doctors not do and they don't verify Certain codes they just verify whether or not the patient has chiropractic benefits. Okay, that's great. But do they cover decompression therapy? Do they cover, how do they cover rehab nine, seven, one, one Oh, how do they cover maintenance care? And we don't ask those questions,

Sara Amburgey:

right? All the favorites I'll add to that extremity, right? Extremities. Exactly. Do they pay for an extremity adjustment? And what's interesting about that is that you will find in each state. It can vary. There's not consistency. So please don't ask your buddy that you graduated chiropractic college with it. They have an extremity from Blue Cross Blue Shield in your area because it won't match. Sometimes it does, but sometimes it doesn't. It's also important. I think doc to understand how often can we bill a re exam? We might. In the chiropractic side, say, okay, we're going to treat the patient three times a week for four weeks, and then we're going to do a reexam. Okay. That's perfect. I think that's great. But insurance, just no insurance is probably not going to cover that. A lot of them don't cover it when you bill with a CMT code. A lot of them don't cover it. If you bill it by itself, no CMT code, And less than 30 days. So insurance companies, a lot of times say, Nope, you've got to wait till the 31st day to bill that E and M code. And so you end up in that situation. I would like to say, please appeal it and heal. If you're doing your CMT and your exam on the very first night, I shouldn't even say the very first day on the same day. If you're doing that, It's okay, but appeal it. Don't let them deny that exam because you guys are spending more time with those patients and you are doing things that are outside the scope of an adjustment.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

And you have to prove medical necessity to be building the insurance. And in my opinion, at least the only way to really prove medical necessity is that periodic progress exam to show the insurance company. And if you don't bill it, then they don't know you're doing it. We've seen doctors get audited because they never build a progress exam. They did them, but they just didn't bill them because the insurance company wasn't going to pay for it. So the insurance company thought there's probably a medical necessity issue here.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. And that I'm glad you, I'm glad you brought that topic up because if you do it, we have to bill it. So we can't not bill a service if If we perform a service, we should bill it. That's absolutely yes. And I do see offices do that. Not because they're trying to do anything wrong. Like you said, just, it's not going to be covered. So why take the time to bill it? But really, the opposite is true and really appeals are not that hard. And if you don't know where to find an appeal, there's an appeal form online, Google, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida. Appeal form. It's there. If you don't have access to one already, they're out there. You just do as a quick Google search to find them. And it's worth it because you're going to get that money that you deserve for the services that you're providing to the patient.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Which makes me think about reviewing all the insurance companies policies every year. They're LCD. They don't all call them an LCD, but it's amazing what those tell you. They tell you in these documents exactly how to document, for example.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. And so many people get scared of insurance companies, but I'm like, it's right there in black and white. Don't be afraid to find, call call the insurance company, find out where you can find your provider manual, do the provider thing. Instead of going through all the patient prompts, go through the provider prompts and find your manual. Most of the time they're going to be on the insurance company portal. And so you can find them on the insurance company portals to see which. Comes back around to even Medicare. That's where I see a lot of big mistakes is with Medicare. They don't realize that Medicare advantage plans are doing a lot better now by marking advantage or replacement or advantage on the card and labeling it on the card. That's good. They are getting better, but, so many times we'll get a Medicare patient, they walk in. They slap down all their cards. Then the staff might be new, may not be familiar. If we check Medicare benefits on your Medicare portal, it is there, you guys. It will say Medicare Part C. If they're Medicare Part C, that red, white, and blue traditional card, bye bye. We don't need it. It's null and void because that advantage plan. Then we are not billing Medicare. We're not wasting time to get that rejection and some advantage plans need authorization. It's important to know are you part of the advantage plan? Because if you're just because you're a provider with United does not automatically put you in with United advantage. It's important to know what you're part of. As well, when we're verifying these insurance benefits and going back and finding out our certain codes covered, we all know with Medicare, that's a different code. But going back to what you said originally, doc, and in my long winded answer here is getting to the specifics of the codes they cover because they will not tell you if they're going to pay for the code, but they will tell you if it's a billable code. Yep. And when you're doing your insurance verifications. So all of that is important. And for staff, guys, this is your way that you can go in and say, I deserve a raise because look, we're collecting all this money. So it's money lost. And we're losing money. We're tossing money out the window. It's so easy to justify to go into your boss and say, Hey I would love to have a raise. Our collections are up X percent because we've now been verifying insurance benefits and we're collecting more money because of it.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Yep. And that, that is one of the big advantages of doing those verifications is really understanding how the insurance company might pay you. Like you said, they're not going to tell you if they're going to pay you because that depends on a whole lot of other factors. But at least you find out what's billable and what's not. Exactly. And that's important. And that's very important. I want to talk a little bit about Medicare. So in my opinion, Medicare is probably the easiest. I'm using air quotes. If you're listening, insurance companies because it's not insurance. But to me, it's one of the easiest things to deal with. And yet I see so many docs getting it all mixed up. And I heard a couple of doctors Recently in the last probably 30 days say, oh, Medicare now has unlimited benefits for chiropractic care. Wow where are you getting that? Because that's not true. So I don't know if it's just, we've got a lot of disinformation floating around the profession and too much of talking to your friend across the country. But I want to set the record straight on some of that. So I'm just going to ask you flat out. You're the expert. Is there unlimited care under Medicare?

Sara Amburgey:

No, it's like any other insurance company. It's all based on medical necessity where I do think some of the confusion comes in is back in the day. We had a 12 visit limit on Medicare and Medicare did not care if the patient came in three times a week or if they came in one time a month, they could use those however they wanted to. And I think sometimes there are some providers that say, Still think that, or they heard that, like you said, from their buddy and it's incorrect. It's all based on medical necessity.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

All based on medical necessity. Yes. I can't say that enough.

Sara Amburgey:

Yes. And this is where I get in trouble with some doctors when I'm working with them and talking with them is everything. We all know in our heart of hearts that chiropractic is necessary. That's where we have to take off our hat and put on our insurance. Can we have our passion hat has to come off and we have to be realistic with this is what. Medicare is going to consider medically necessary. That's when we're billing that at modifier just because you put that at modifier on there for acute treatment does not mean that the visits going to be covered. This is where people's minds below when we're talking about billing and these kinds of things, because at doesn't mean that at doesn't mean it's going to be paid. And guess what? Everybody, if you bill an AT, And Medicare denies, you cannot collect from that patient, right? So it is important for you to understand when to build GA, as the professional doctor, when the patient has reached their maximum medical improvement not I got to keep adjusting them. So they don't get surgery. That's not it. So we've. If their maximum medical improvement, their pain level is a level 5 and. They can only walk up 5 flights of stairs instead of 10. We can't get him to that 6 flight of stairs. That's it. That's it. Our goal might have been 10 flights of stairs and our goal might have been a pain level 2, but we can't get him beyond. That's that's it. I will say, doc, I'm sorry to interrupt you. I will say that and neck disability forms are big and Medicare having the patient fill those out and you do have to. Think about I've got a positive poly patient, as I've always said, throughout the years, or negative Ned, because negative Ned is going to be pain level of 10 all the time and can't put his pants on where, positive poly is going to be a 2 and can't put her pants on, it's the names. So we have to be a little bit realistic in relationship to how they're filling out those forms. Thank you. Yeah.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

And you actually read my mind because I was going to bring up outcome assessment tools.

Sara Amburgey:

Great minds, Doc.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Great minds. Exactly. Exactly. That's why we're here on the show together. That's right. That's why we've been friends forever. But those outcome assessment tools, I think to me are one of the greatest Things since individually wrapped in sliced cheese for the chiropractic profession, because it allows you to document from the patient's point of view, how am I progressing and it creates that disability percentage and when it doesn't go any further, you're done. That's right. Put an ABN in front of them. I don't want to talk about the ABN, but put an ABN from them, explain to them the difference in care. You really should explain it up front. So they're not blindsided by it, but that's another story. And if you if you're still clinically appropriate, great, keep going with chiropractic care. That's where our philosophy has to come in. But like you said, we have to take that chiropractic passion hat off for just a minute. So we know that we're playing the insurance game correctly.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. And really, that goes back to the insurance verification and the report of findings. And when you're discussing all of the things with any patient, any insurance company is based on medical necessity and really acute care just because you've been billing Blue Cross for 2 years with the same diagnosis with the same injury dates does not mean that in 3 years, Blue Cross isn't going to come back and ask you for the money back because they will. Blue I just

Dr. Michael Perusich:

had fingernails on the chalkboard when he said that. Yeah. Cause we hear all the time. They're paying me. So everything must be okay. No, they're just waiting until the audit department has time to come and take all the money back.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. And that's why I mentioned. To providers all the time, audits are not random. They just haven't caught up to you yet. I mean, get your house in order to get your house in order now, because I talked to a provider recently that had a 2016 date. On his claim form and could not figure out why he wasn't getting paid. And I said, doc, anytime you fill out that claim form, we're painting a picture to the insurance company. And so we've got to be mindful of those box 14 and 15 dates based on for medical necessity. And please don't be the office that changes your box 14, 15, every 12 visits, because that Also sets up a profile. Be logical. If somebody came in on Monday with low back pain, and you treated them for 6 weeks, and now they're, they've reached. Their improvement, and they're where they are, and then they come into, let's say. In another 2 months, they have the same problem again, but they were gardening, or they went surfing, or they went snow skiing, or they sat in their office chair for. Several hours and their back flared up. That's a new box.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

1415. Yeah. So I have the pleasure of I'll say pleasure of reviewing records for doctors sometimes just, they just want to know if their records are good before they send them in or they just, they're trying to build their EHR system or whatever. Anytime I see that happening where the diagnosis date is changed, the immediate thing I go and look for is where's your exam. Prove to me what the new diagnosis is. How did you come up with the onset date? What did the patient say about their pain? What are your orthopedic testing look like? Why is there no exam in here? You just changed the. You just changed things on the palpation. Your palpation didn't actually change. It carried over from the last visit. And if it's a Medicare patient, where's your PART? That's right. So we've got to remember when we change diagnosis and you bring up a great point, you can't let a diagnosis get too old. And I've always gone by the adage of two months. Anything longer than two months could be too old. Could be. But if you just randomly change the diagnosis, you've got to have proof of why you change the diagnosis. What's the rationale behind it?

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. And that's where I think people's offices, I see a lot just, okay, we're going to change the diagnosis because they haven't been in two months. So like you said, sometimes that's the case. They could just be coming into for a maintenance visit at that two month point. So that's where all of the doctors have to make that professional determination. Is this a new injury? Or a flare up of the same condition. If it's a flare up at the same condition, then that's fine. I use myself as an example all the time. I started seeing a chiropractor in 1983. I injured my low back and. We don't put 1983 in my claim form. So I'm seeing my chiropractor on Friday. I haven't been there in probably 6 months. Shame on me. Shame on you. That's right. Shame on me. I'm in a flare right now. So on Friday, when I go in, it will, he'll do a reexam on me and then build the right code with the right modifiers and get me adjusted and justify everything that he's done for me to. Reflect a little bit on what you were saying about records and reviewing records. All of you all as providers have received records. And cannot make heads or tails out of them when a patient has transferred to your care. So that's exactly how the adjusters feel or the auditors feel when they're looking at it. We have to paint a picture to them. They're understanding exactly. What's going on? And that is not to say in your E. M. R. S. That you're using to go fill in every single blank. That's not the point. The point is to make sure that what you're doing for the patient is medically necessary and matches with the insurance verification. So you everybody knows what to collect, what's covered. What's a billable service, what's not billable, what you can collect directly from the patient for versus what you can't. And tie everything together. It's really simple. It sounds like a lot, but it's really simple.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

It is really simple. I know a lot of docs are probably sitting out there listening to this and going, Oh my gosh, I can't do all this. Number one, make sure EHR system set up correctly. Make sure you've got all the macros and everything in there that you need. There are very few systems out there that won't Work at a fast pace as fast as paces as you need, unless you don't set them up correctly. I know we, we spent a great deal of time setting up our system with your help. In fact making sure that it worked and flowed with our workflows. So that, we were seeing. 100, 150, not new, but 100, 150 patients a day. And, our note system kept up with us and we were doing the exams and documenting medical necessity and all those things. So you can do it. So if you're out there thinking, oh, my gosh, this is going to kill my practice to do all this extra work. It's not plus. And you mentioned it a little bit ago. Your staff's going to come to you and go, Hey, doc, because we're checking all the boxes and doing the right things and verifying insurance and all that. And we understand what we're, we can bill and how we can bill. We're collecting more money and we're doing greater things for patients because of it. So there's really a positive into the rainbow here.

Sara Amburgey:

100%. Patients want to know 2 things when they come in. Can you fix me? And how much is it going to cost? That's what they want to know. And if we can ease their minds on that first visit with that insurance verification and what they're going to be responsible for, it's a done deal. Patients stop coming because they're fearful. I shouldn't say this is the only reason, but they're fearful of what it's going to cost. They don't understand. And if you're, if you. And your staff can't explain it, how in the heck is the patient supposed to understand

Dr. Michael Perusich:

it? Yeah. The EOB was created by the insurance companies to keep everybody confused and it does a great job of it. But if you can be the resource for the patient to help not only understand their EOB, but be able to pinpoint the cost of care pretty darn close. Every time they come in, you take that fear away. And when you take that fear away, they relax. And guess what? That becomes the patient who will stay, pay, refer, and believe in what you do. And they'll send other people into you and they'll never leave you. And I know we talked to a lot of docs who are having trouble with patients dropping out of care. And a big part of it is because we're not having this financial conversation up front.

Sara Amburgey:

That's exactly right. I see a lot of people that are fearful of finances and talking that to them, but there's no fear when everything is addressed up front. Everybody knows what to expect. And in your billing system, you should be able to set up allowables in there. Percentages that. If a patient is 8020, you can collect as close as you can to that percentage of those billable codes. Set that up, take the time and talk to your EMR systems out there and get those allowed amounts set up so you can collect accurately at your front desk. I, I see that happen with new staff. They're fearful to ask for money because they don't understand what they're supposed to be asking for because they're. Billing system is not set up correctly. So they don't even know.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Or they're sitting there at the front counter with their calculator, trying to figure out what the patient knows because they don't have the allowables and percentages all set

Sara Amburgey:

up. That's right. All right. I've been into many offices where I see sticky notes attached over, Oh, this is Blue Cross Blue Shields. I'm going to grab that sticky note. And this is what you owe.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

That was our office. You were there. That was a long

Sara Amburgey:

time ago. I wasn't going to say anything, that was funny. But. But once you knew you all set it up and it was done, it was a done deal. It makes it easy to calculate those things. And if you don't know the exact allowable for a particular insurance company, have a plan. Exactly. Have a plan so nobody is petrified to be at the front desk. And one of the things I like to say at the front desk, I work to the front desk. Like I said, Jack of all trades in the chiropractic clinic working the front desk. One of the things I always like to say is as of today, your balance is 2365. As of today, your balance is 65 82 followed up by how would you like to pay? But always saying as of today, why do we say that? Because tomorrow I could get an EOB in and they've denied your care and you're going to add more money, or they're going to pay a little differently than what we have paid. Thought they were going to pay. So if we're constantly saying the same things at the front desk all the time, if we're constantly saying how would you like to pay? That's a simple question. Your balance is 65 82. How would you like to pay? You're not saying I need 65 82 from you, please. It's to pay. Can I pay next time? Can I pay part today? We're leaving them an open ended question so those collections

Dr. Michael Perusich:

can go up. Yep. That's exactly right. Great point. If people want to get in touch with you, how can you help them?

Sara Amburgey:

That's a trick question. Cause I do, I wear a lot of hats. I know you

Dr. Michael Perusich:

do. That's why I posted open ended. Thank you.

Sara Amburgey:

You can get in touch with me via my cell phone. I'm a wide open book on my cell phone. Feel free to reach out to me I'm happy to give you my cell phone number. It's ready. Are we ready for that? It is 602 690 0509. If you decide that you're going to text me, please let me know who you are because I get a lot of text messages. The other thing I would like to say, if you decide to call or text me on that number, and if I'm not back to you in two days, please reach out to me. Sometimes my text is. So full that I am human and I am going to miss something that's easy. Yes. And so if truly my goal is two days and really same day as my real goal, but if it's two days, if it's beyond two days, something's gone on, I missed your message, I never received your message, but I'm happy to help with any of those questions that have come up that we've addressed today.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Awesome. And I know you do. I'm going to put a shameless plug in here because it's one of my favorites, but you do a lot of work with the Eclipse, which I personally think is a great program. I'm a little biased because we use that in our clinic. But you were telling me they've got a cloud version coming out.

Sara Amburgey:

Yeah, we've actually had the cloud version out for three years.

Dr. Michael Perusich:

Oh, I didn't even know that.

Sara Amburgey:

That's great. Yes. Yeah. It's been out and it's very affordable. It's super fun because we can offer things in the cloud version that we couldn't in the windows version. 1 of those things being insurance verification directly from the software. So we couldn't do that in the windows version. So that's 1 of the fun things we can do with cloud. And also 1 of the biggest questions we get when we start talking about cloud is. Is server going away? Absolutely not. We've got over 30 years of development in the server version. Why in the world do we get rid of a fantastic program that works for so many? And also there's rural property, rural communities out there that don't have great internet. Still, and even satellite doesn't work in some of those places, right? And so those people need a software too. So we are not abandoning the server version at all. So you can reach out to me if you have any questions about either one of those, because we can transition any Eclipse client over to cloud and not lose a single bit of

Dr. Michael Perusich:

data. Fantastic. Fantastic program. Great company. So Sarah, thanks for your time today. I really want to get you back on again because there's so many other little nuances and insurance that I want to dig into. And I think it'd be fun if we got Marisa on here and we did all 3 of us on here and just had a little banter about insurance. Yeah. A round

Sara Amburgey:

table. I love

Dr. Michael Perusich:

that. Yes. That would be fun. That'd be fun. So Hey everybody, if you haven't done so yet, go check out Kats consultants. com. See all the great things that we're doing to help clients and just doctors in general out there. There's some free downloads on there. And as always, we appreciate our guests like Sarah coming on our show. All right, KC Chiro Pulse podcast every week. And make sure you subscribe the buttons down here somewhere and go check out Kats consultants. com as well as our other sponsor, Chiro health USA. We'll see you guys next time. Thanks for having

Sara Amburgey:

me.

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