In the healthcare sector, medical coding is very complex and critical and requires expertise and attention to detail. Therefore, many healthcare practices prefer hiring offshore medical coding services to hire an in-house team of billers and coders that are hard to manage and have high costs. Is offshore medical coding services a better option than hiring medical coders in-house? Let’s find out.
Offshore Medical Coding vs Onshore Medical Coding
Quality of Coding Service:
The quality of the coding service is the first thing we consider when comparing onshore vs offshore medical coding. Having an onshore coding team means that your healthcare providers have to take care of the medical coding, which can be hectic for them and potentially impact their patient care. On the other hand, hiring an offshore medical coding service sounds better as they have medical coding experts that will take care of your practice’s medical coding needs without affecting patient care.
Legal Compliance and Regulations:
When doing medical coding, it’s essential to abide by all legal compliance and healthcare regulations because if it’s not happening, your practice will be in deep trouble. Offshore medical coding services generally adhere to legal compliance and regulations as they know every detail about medical coding compliance guidelines and their legal implications. On the other hand, an in-house coder might need to gain more comprehensive knowledge of medical coding guidelines and the constant updates that are coming.
Cost:
Cost is a very subjective matter when it comes to comparing offshore vs onshore medical coding. If your healthcare providers are taking care of the medical coding along with their healthcare services, it might cost you less than hiring an offshore medical coding service. However, hiring an offshore service will cost you less if you hire an onshore medical coding team rather than healthcare providers doing the coding.
Turnaround Time:
Offshore medical coding services generally have professional coding experts that are well-trained and have good expertise in their domain. Hence, their turnaround time is usually less than an in-house healthcare provider coding himself while taking care of other things, such as patient care.
Security of Data:
In the healthcare sector, the security of patient data is considered of paramount importance. Therefore, it’s better to do the medical coding onshore as it will help in securing the privacy of the patient’s data as you can track and monitor everything happening within the practice. Hiring an offshore medical coding service means you need to rely solely on their service and can’t be sure if they are doing enough to secure the data.
Training and Education:
While it is difficult to train and educate staff in-house to do medical coding as you will need additional resources to do that, hiring a medical coding team that is offshore sounds more easy and seamless as they are already trained to do all sorts of coding tasks and know what it takes to do medical coding right.
Final Verdict:
Offshore medical coding is a more viable and better option for medical practices than doing it in-house by hiring a team of coders. Not only does it save you costs and human resources, but it also helps you with improved compliance and lesser claim denials. So if you are considering outsourcing your coding work to a medical company, you think it is right!
