Better Business Intelligence: Enhanced CPT Code Analysis
Historically, radiology practices have looked at CPT® code volume as a measure of work. As Greg Thomson, CPA, executive vice president of Medical Management Professionals, Inc (MMP), Atlanta, Georgia, explains , “It is the widget we have used to measure the work performed by our physician clients, and also a measure of the work performed in the billing office.” Thomson and his colleague Jana Landreth, CPA, MBA, would argue, however, that there are better ways to measure physician work—and that practices are often neglecting to pursue the full range of business intelligence available from analysis of these kinds of data.
Landreth, who is director of practice management for MMP, says, “CPT codes have historically been looked at in the aggregate. Perhaps you would break it down as far as total CT codes or total MRI codes, but the analysis did not look at how many individual codes you were performing, or what the trend was there.”
Instead, Thomson says, practices have traditionally focused on CPT codes as a means of measuring radiologists’ work, misusing potentially valuable data. “We are transitioning to better measures of work or time spent,” he says. “When you look at how specific lines of work break down within the practice, however, it is revealing.”