Supporting Better Operational and Financial Performance With EMS-Hospital Collaboration
A large amount of healthcare spend can be traced to inefficient patient throughput, delayed access to treatment, and excess length of...
ZOLL Data Systems
Rescue Squad Adopts an Intuitive CAD Solution To Ramp up Dispatch and Improve Data Visualization
Princeton Rescue Squad (Princeton) was struggling withtheir complex, pen-and-paper process for dispatch. The manual method made data...
Make This the Year You Optimize Accounts Receivable and Capture Maximum Revenue
A new year means new opportunities to set goals, reevaluate current workflows, and make the necessary changes to enhance your accounts...
Inovalon, a provider of cloud-based healthcare clinical and economic solutions, wanted to help their collections agency customer (serving...
EMS-to-Hospital Handoffs Can Be a More Streamlined Experience
The transfer of care from emergency medical service (EMS) to the hospital emergency departments (ED) is often a chaotic process.i Some of...
Your Agency Isn’t Getting Paid: Here’s What You Can Do
You might be surprised at how many billing challenges are common for every agency. Issues that cause payment delays or denials are the same...
5 Ways to Achieve Revenue Integrity and Avoid Payment Delays
Revenue integrity is the goal of every billing department. If an agency can achieve this goal, its documentation will stand up to the...
Providers: Take Back Power During Payer Contract Negotiations
Covering reimbursement rates, medical necessity, credentialing, and prior authorization (PA), payer-provider contracts are key to emergency...
Meet the New ZOLL Dispatch and ZOLL Respond CAD Solution
When seconds count, it’s imperative that call takers and dispatchers have the right tools in place to get the optimal level of care out to...
Providers Can Even the Playing Field During Open Negotiations – Here’s How
Emergency medical service (EMS) providers are facing ongoing challenges when it comes to receiving the maximum reimbursement rate from...
E-Care Uses Full Cloud-based EMS Solution Suite to Streamline Operations
Based in Key Largo, Florida, E-Care Ambulance (E-Care) launched as a small, but fast-growing service offering BLS, ALS, and critical care...
Data Interoperability Drives Better Coordination of Care in Emergent Patient Transitions
Everything that happens in an ambulance has a huge impact on what happens to a patient in a hospital. Unfortunately, handoffs between...
Proactive EMS-Hospital Communication Better Prepares Providers for Faster, Safer Care
The data obtained by emergency medical technicians (EMTs) on-scene sometimes is not translated into optimal hospital care during handoffs....
Collect More Revenue Faster: The Pivotal Role of Clear, Concise, and Complete Documentation
Electronic patient care reports (ePCRs) should paint a vivid picture; if it is not documented, it didn’t happen! Documentation is the key...
Gain More Confidence and a Stronger Position During Open Negotiations and IDR
Since the No Surprises Act (NSA) has gone into effect, emergency medicine (EM) physicians and emergency medical service (EMS) air ambulance...
How the Prior Authorization Process Tests Patients, Providers, and Profits
The prior authorization (PA) process was created as a utilization management tool for insurance companies and patients. However, it has...
How Bi-directional Data Exchange Delivers Insights That Improve the Continuum of Care
Access to comprehensive patient data throughout the continuum of care is a major interest for multiple stakeholders. Emergency department...
Mayo Clinic Ambulance (Mayo Clinic) pursued an integrated platform that would allow them to advance patient care, medicine, and service,...
St. Luke’s Emergency & Transport Services (SLETS) needed to meet a demand of 25,000 yearly patients accounting for 5,000 transport requests...
With two separate, siloed counties to manage, Virtua Health Patient Logistics (Virtua) found an opportunity to better control its data and...
JFK EMS Cultivates a Culture of Quality Care Through Seamless Feedback — ZOLL Pulse Award Winner
JFK University Medical Center (JFK EMS) needed a patient documentation software solution to better support their QA/QI processes. With a...
How Emergency Medicine Providers Can Mitigate Self-Pay Collection Challenges
Across the country, emergency medicine providers are strapped by workforce gaps and swamped by a rising tide of patient visits to the...
Tips for Making Compliance with Medicare Ground Ambulance Data Collection Requirements Easier
With reporting deadlines looming for the Medicare Ground Ambulance Data Collection System (GADCS), it’s of vital importance to understand...
Strategies and Tips for Capturing Optimal EMS Reimbursement
When EMS agencies maximize reimbursement revenue from patient transports, they help keep their organization financially strong so that they...
6 Ways to Power Up Your Clinical, Operational, and Financial Performance at ZOLL Summit 2023
ZOLL® Summit is back this June and is bigger and better than ever. As our largest and longest running educational event of the year, ZOLL...
How a Fire Department Used the New ZOLL emsCharts App to Solve Problems with Charting in the Field
Paper-based charting in the field is still the norm for EMS and Fire medics. Logging into a browser-based ePCR system simply isn’t...
Tips for Managing the Surge of Patients About To Lose Medicaid Coverage
What happens when millions of people lose healthcare coverage in one year? That’s the question healthcare providers are apprehensively...
Proven Ways EMS Agencies Can Minimize Impact and Maximize Reimbursement From Self-pay Accounts
“Self-pay accounts are leaving EMS agencies “hanging by their fingernails.” So says Maggie Adams, President of EMS Financial Services.It’s...
How To Navigate the 2023 AMA Evaluation and Management Changes Like a Pro
Understanding recent, nuanced changes to American Medical Association (AMA) coding standards will be essential for maintaining financially...
Should Your Agency Bring EMS Billing In-house?
Is it worth it to bring your EMS billing in-house? Sooner or later, every organization that outsources its billing and collections...
5 Things You Need to Know About NEMSIS v3.5
As the new year begins, most states are preparing to, or already have, released their National EMS Information System (NEMSIS) v3.5...
EDI, AI, Robots, and Machine Learning: Demystifying Healthcare Software Automation
Facing an increasing number and complexity of claims, many healthcare organizations are hoping that software automation can provide billing...
Technology Fills the Revenue Cycle Skills Gap and Enhances Financial Performance
Ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) have had to weather multiple storms in recent years. First, when procedure volume dropped during the...
6 Steps to a Better Patient Experience Through Financial Transparency
When patients receive attention and care on the financial portion of medical care, along with quality patient care, it can reduce stress,...
The EMS industry is experiencing unprecedented challenges, including staffing shortages and unsustainable revenue models. Matt Zavadsky,...
When the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE) expires, it will be a pivotal time for providers, payers, and patients. As state Medicaid...
Golder Ranch Fire District (GRFD) leadership wanted to ensure that they were maximizing the functionality of RescueNet® Billing software...
City of Allentown EMS (Allentown EMS) management had a vision for moving to a cloud-based billing solution to support the growing need to...
University Medical Center’s (UMC EMS)service area has been steadily growing, and agency leadership recognized the need for a...
TransCare Medical Transportation Services (TransCare), a division of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay, has a mission “to ensure that no one...
Mutual Aid EMS operates 14 ambulance stations across a 924 square-mile service area. Agency leadership saw tremendous opportunity to...
How Collecting Payment for Inspections is Changing the Fire Industry
In a recent webinar, Pasco County Fire and Rescue (PCFR) Fire Marshal, Justin Frum, discussed how his team overcame the challenges...
Purpose-Built, Integrated Platforms Are the Future of Telemedicine
Telemedicine is becoming standard practice for many healthcare providers. According to Dr. David Ernst, president of telemedicine innovator...
Many laboratories face financial challenges due to persistent downward pricing pressure, making it essential to capture payment on all...
Compliance Accreditation and Patient Safety with Pre-hospital Emergency Care
In Emergency Departments (ED) and Intensive Care Units (ICU) in the U.S., more than half of critically ill patients arrive via ambulance....
Strategies for Reducing Payment Uncertainty With Less Effort and More Satisfaction
In a recent webinar hosted by Healthcare Business Management Association (HBMA), AR optimization expert, Juli Smith, discussed the growing...
Conquering Billing Challenges Early in the Patient Encounter
Healthcare providers are striving to meet rising demand in their communities but are feeling the burden of prior authorization get heavier....
Billing Survival Strategies: Medicare Advantage and Medicaid Managed Care
(2 min read) As the demand for Medicare Advantage and Medicaid managed care grows, so do the rules and regulations — which means more...
Short-staffed ASCs Can Ease the Burden of Prior Authorization and Do More With Less
(2 min read) Ambulatory Surgical Centers (ASCs) do an exceptional job of collecting patient deductibles, co-pays, and other patient...
How and Why Bringing EMS Billing In-house Could Be Right for You
If you currently outsource your billing and collections functions and are considering bringing them in-house, you’ll want to assess whether...
(2 min read) The current emergency medical services (EMS) economic model follows a pay-per-transport system. Insurance agencies and...
Labs of All Sizes Can Benefit From Employing Revenue-enhancing Best Practices
(2 min read) The COVID-19 lockdown caused a rapid drop-off in routine labs and specialty testing. Even those that were processing COVID...
Complete Patient Documentation Earns More Revenue and Mitigates Liability Risk
(3 min read) During the 2021 ZOLL Summit Series ePCR & Fire event, quality assurance analyst and clinical educator, Jason Haag, spoke about
Custom Reports Inform Your Quality Improvement Initiatives With Data-driven Insight
(5 min read) If you learn to leverage the custom reports function for your ePCR system, you can stay focused on critical issues while...
The History of NEMSIS 3.5 and How a Data-driven Industry Saves More Lives
The Evolution of NEMSIS, the National EMS Information System (3 min read) The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) built...
5 Critical Medicare Updates Every EMS Agency Should Know
(5 min read) For many years, EMS agencies and advocacy groups like the American Ambulance Associates (AAA) have been battling for adequate...
Understanding How to Get Paid by the Department of Veterans Affairs for Ambulance Transports
(3 min read) Getting reimbursement for ambulance transport from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) can be challenging. For...
Top 6 Tips for Optimizing EMS Reimbursement, Care Quality, and Staffing
(4 min read) Technology is transforming how the healthcare industry manages revenue, reimbursements. Claims processing is central to any...
ZOLL® Pulse Award Winner Helps Tucson Agency Increase Payments by 12%
(3 min read) The ZOLL Pulse Awards, first launched at the 2017 ZOLL Summit, recognizes professionals who improve operational efficiencies...
ZOLL® Pulse Award Winner Helps Florida Agency Achieve Higher Levels of Operational Performance
(5 min read) The ZOLL Pulse Awards, first launched at the 2017 ZOLL Summit, recognizes professionals who improve operational efficiencies...
Spring Cleaning for Your EMS Billing
(2 min read) The COVID-19 pandemic has made it more important than ever for EMS agency billers and managers to conduct their annual reviews...
Tools and Strategies to Improve Revenue and Reduce Administrative Burden
(2 min read) “One overarching thing I think that we are struggling with today as healthcare providers is payment uncertainty. We really...
Aggregating COVID-19 Data for a More Holistic View of the Pandemic
(3 min read) In March 2021, Greg Howard, Director of National Interoperability Sales at ZOLL Medical Corporation, and Mario Sanchez, ...
The Patient’s Financial Experience: Trends, Innovations, and Challenges
Juli Forde, Director of Strategic Partnerships, AR Optimization at ZOLL® Data Systems partnered with Jonathan Wiik, Principal, Healthcare...
How Emergency Medicine Physicians Can Increase Revenue in 2021 With Medicare PFS Cuts Looming
In August 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released the proposed Medicare annual payment rule for 2021. This rule...
Reducing Emergency Department Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) in 2021
In 2020, emergency department volume reductions and an increase in uninsured patients have caused financial ripple effects through the...
The Cash Pay Lie and Other Costly Realities
In an effort to maintain or increase patient volume and reduce collections costs, physician groups increasingly are offering substantial...
Participating in the ET3 Model? Here’s What You Need to Know About NEMSIS Reporting Requirements
With thousands of Emergency Medical Services (EMS) agencies throughout the U.S., there are inevitably hundreds or even thousands of...
The American Medical Association (AMA) and many other organizations are actively advocating for continued support of telehealth...
What’s Next? More EMS Billing in the COVID Environment
Like all other providers in the healthcare ecosystem, emergency medical services (EMS) agencies have been impacted in many ways by the...
EMS Billing in the COVID-19 Environment
(2 min read) In April 2020,the National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians (NAEMT) conducted a survey to assess the early impact...
Offering Patient-centric Payment Plans Increases Provider Collections by More than 11%
(2 min read) Most healthcare providers report offering patient payment plans. The plans are popular; approximately half of consumers state...
Learning from Aviation Safety: Part 2 - Checklists
In 1935, a fatal airplane crash changed the aviation safety world. It was at Wright Field near Dayton, Ohio, when the Boeing aircraft...
Learning from Aviation Safety: Part 1 – Crew Resource Management
Has this ever happened to you: You’re the new person starting your first day at a service with a seasoned medic. You get your first call of...
Reducing Preventable Crashes with Road Safety
Leonard Callier, along with a team from South Texas Emergency Care Foundation (STEC), was able to significantly reduce preventable crashes...
Want to Continue to Cultivate Your Culture of Safety? Hire for Behavior
EMS or Fire organizations that have committed, or are planning to develop, a culture of safety have many challenges facing them. For the...
Are You Risking Lives When Trying to Save Lives?
Personal experience certainly makes a believer out of you. While working for a former EMS agency, I was present to see firsthand what...
How to Monitor EMS Driver Performance
Driver safety doesn’t just affect crews and passenger, it affects the entire community. With increased adrenalin, lights and sirens, and...
How to Prevent Tampering on Your Road Safety Device
It’s not a matter of if; it’s matter of when. Tampering of any company-owned equipment is very serious, and the consequences can be...
Road Safety Enhancements Provide Greater Insight into Ambulance Safety
In the April release of ZOLL Online, we’re introducing the new Road Safety Overview dashboard and an improved reporting experience. These...
12 Expenses to Consider When Calculating the Cost of an Ambulance Crash
Reimbursements continue to be challenging in EMS, and the future unfortunately doesn’t paint a favorable outlook any time soon. While sound...
How to Improve Your EMS Agency's Safety Policy
Executive, operation and safety leadership should make sure safety policies are reviewed annually and up-to-date. The New Year is an...
Lights & Sirens: What You Can Do to Evaluate & Reduce Risk
The most unsafe aspect of working in EMS is being in an ambulance while it’s operating in a lights and sirens mode. The statistics have...
Is Prevention Addressing Driver Behavior or is it a Safe Vehicle Design?
When it comes to ambulance safety, prevention is paramount. Is prevention addressing driver behavior or is it a safe vehicle design? From...
Ambulance Safety Policies Only Work if They Are Enforced
How many times have you experienced when someone messes up, it’s inevitable that sooner or later a new policy is handed down. Now granted...
Safe Vehicle Operations: A Shift Toward a "Culture of Safety"
Before the days of wearing personal protective equipment, safety consisted of protecting yourself from a combative patient or keeping your...
The Culture of Safety in Ambulance Operations
There are many different aspects of safety in an EMS organization; vehicle operations, patient care and staff safety. By far the area that...
Carving Out Ambulance Crash Costs
EMS providers face challenging revenue issues with reimbursement rates continuing to decline. Unfortunately expenses to operate are always...