Paperwork angst pushes Ohio doctors, insurers to cost-cutting, streamlining Web portal

Paperwork angst drives Ohio doctor, insurer effort

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio doctors, hospitals and health care insurers said Monday they have a new weapon against the pain of paperwork.

It’s a single Web portal they believe will reduce duplication, miscommunication, and confusion between doctors and insurance companies. That will mean quicker office and hospital service, more time for patient care, and, ultimately, cost savings, participants said.

It’s a collaboration to begin next month, one the eight major health insurers representing 91 percent called an example for the nation.

A host of doctor groups, including the state medical association, have endorsed the initiative.

Monday’s announcement comes on the heels of President Obama continued to push in Washington for paperwork streamlining to be included in national health care reform legislation.

Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans, said the program can do for health care what ATMs did for banks.

It is beginning in Ohio and New Jersey, whose programs can then be fine-tuned and rolled out nationwide, she said.

“Initiatives that streamline health care administration, such as this effort, have great potential to slow the growth of the cost of care and contribute to savings nationally,” said Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of America’s Health Insurance Plans.

Bradley Fluegel, executive vice president at WellPoint, parent company of Anthem Blue Cross & Blue Shield, said studies have shown the U.S. health care system could save up to $30 billion through automation of paperwork functions.

Anthem is among those private insurers that have signed on to use the new portal, provided by Jacksonville, Fla.-based Availity. The others are Aetna, Cigna, Kaiser Permanente, Medical Mutual of Ohio, Humana, UnitedHealthcare, and WellCare Health Plans.

The federal Medicare system, and the state-federal health insurance program Medicaid are not yet involved in the Ohio project. Medicaid has been part of similar programs in other states, officials said, and those negotiations are still ongoing.

Julie Klapstein, chief executive of Availity, said the portal concept was piloted in Florida, but it took almost eight years to engage as many doctors, hospitals and health insurers as the Ohio initiative has at the outset.

“It’s really about getting that tipping point of health plans all on one that makes it easy for the doctors to use it. They all start going to that,” she said. “What’s really fun is once you get them using their base business on the same place, then you can start adding new things like health records, ID cards, you can start tying the consumer in. We’re trying to lay the pipe if you will.”

Ignagni said two of the chief concerns of doctors across the country are knowing what patients and treatments are eligible for insurance coverage, and ascertaining the status of an outstanding claim.

“What this initiative does is addresses those two issues head-on,” she said. “It’s going to give physicians information on eligibility for insurance at the point of care, and it’s going to allow them to see the status of that claim.”

State insurance director Mary Jo Hudson said the initiative’s launch followed months of painstaking negotiations spearheaded by the state through a series of task forces made up of doctors, hospitals, consumers, insurance companies and others.