Emergency medicine and radiology have outside groups that provide that support. In Hopkins' hybrid billing model, the practice plan is responsible for billing and collecting, setting the budget and providing core services, including information systems, training, patient inquiry, quality control and accounts receivable, Wilczek said. In 1997, accounts receivable had grown to more than 124 days. Now, Hopkins is down to 82 days, he said. Because Hopkins' faculty rank at the top of research funding by the National Institutes of Health, Wilczek said there was little support for changing the system of tenure.
Full professors are really good at teaching, research and clinical work.
But Wilczek said the plan was looking closely at pay mix and eliminating unproductive managed care contracts that haven't added much patient volume. We are not going to exclude local patients, but we want to go with those payers with higher reimbursement rates and international patients. Efforts this year are to provide faculty with the latest technology, including handheld electronic devices to order prescriptions. The term we use is, the margins are razor thin. Our faculty are really producing without increasing their costs.