LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- About 40 medical coding layoffs are coming to Baptist Health.
The hospital confirms 15 of those medical coding position layoffs will be at Baptist Health Louisville and Baptist Health Floyd.
The company says the rest of the jobs are spread through the Baptist Health system of eight hospitals. It says those affected will receive severance pay and assistance with their job search.
"It is too early to tell how many people may ultimately be affected as we hope that many will apply for other spots within Baptist Health," said Kit Fullenlove Barry, a Public Relations Manager for Baptist Health.
Baptist Health says AGS Health out of Newark, New Jersey, will now do some of the medical coding instead. Baptist Health says AGS Health has offices in the U.S. and India.
Baptist Health provided this info:
AGS Health, Inc. is an award-winning revenue cycle management company headquartered in Newark, N.J., that provides medical coding and other services to health systems, physician groups and other healthcare providers.
AGS is currently providing coding services to Baptist Health for Primary Care, Physical Therapy (PT), Ancillary, Emergency and Endoscopy Surgery. No other coding areas of responsibility are affected.
This co-sourcing arrangement – using both internal and AGS resources for medical coding – will help reduce costs and improve turnaround time while continuing to provide quality service. The increased complexity of hospital billing and economic pressures have made outsourcing for revenue cycle capabilities a common practice in the healthcare industry. A recent survey found that half of healthcare organizations have others perform at least some of those functions and up to 72 percent plan to do so by 2020.
Co-sourcing our coding capabilities allows Baptist Health to adjust quickly to patient volumes and improves turn-around times – all while maintaining the quality and accuracy of billing processes. While co-sourcing means Baptist Health will retain the majority of the coding employees, 37 home-based positions across the system have been affected
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