75 Percent of Health Systems and Hospitals Will Permanently Change Revenue Cycle Organizations Due to COVID-19

In a survey commissioned by AKASA and conducted through the Healthcare Financial Management Association’s (HFMA) Pulse Survey program, 75 percent of respondents indicated they will permanently change their revenue cycle operations as a result of COVID-19. The survey was fielded between May 19, 2020 and June 22, 2020 among 587 chief financial officers and revenue cycle leaders at hospitals and health systems across the United States. The survey has a confidence level of 95 percent with a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percent.

“COVID-19 has placed healthcare organizations under tremendous financial pressure, driving a need for increased efficiency and cost restructuring. At the same time, revenue cycle teams are facing unpredictable and volatile workloads,” said Malinka Walaliyadde, co-founder and CEO of AKASA. “These dynamics are leading more organizations to adopt work-from-home practices permanently and to embrace automation to make their revenue cycle operations more resilient and flexible.”

According to the survey, larger healthcare providers with $1B – $10B net patient revenues; organizations that have experience with or currently use automation; and health systems (versus hospitals) are statistically more likely to restructure their revenue cycle operations to increase permanent work-from-home staffing post-pandemic.