Chart Review anyone?

I have never done this, but it sounds like something I would enjoy - How did you come about this job? All I can find when i look for jobs are floor jobs, which I would like to get away from. Thanks in advance!

Sorry, the name of the company is Outcomes Inc. I am very hesitant about the entire situation. No one seems to have any current advice or experience with this company. It pays per chart - 4.50...which, what happens if you can only get through 5-6 charts a day? That's less than minimum wage. I did email the contact person and he said that if it doesn't work out for me getting paid per chart, they will compensate per hour if need be.. But again, no hourly rate was quoted. I read on some old posts that people were doing 50 charts a day! That's a lot, and a whole lot of money. It sounds like you're mostly scanning/uploading information to their website. From my experience, that can be very time consuming.

Have you checked this company with the Better Business Bureau if you're in the states? Are they accredited by authorities such as ISO 9000 or URAC? Is this a contract job? I personally don't like the per chart pay. In home health, companies would pay by the visit which I didn't like but you weren't considered a contract employee. I would prefer a base salary and ask specifically how many charts they expect reviewed in 8 hours. What kind of benefits do you get out of this company? If you're going to do physician chart review, will it be on Medicare patients, Medicaid patients, commercial patients? When you go to these offices, will someone be going with you? Will the visits be announced? To me, it sounds like this company may do some contracting for internal/external audits. If that's the case, expect some resistance from the providers. They do not like to be audited. Have you checked the website for your company?

The company is listed on the BBB.. Not a whole lot of information provided there. Outcomes told me that all charts would be pulled ahead of time and there is usually no resistance from the staff. It's a project based position.. so once the project is done, so is the work.. That doesn't matter to me since I return to my school job in August.. So, I don't worry benefits. :)

I am interviewing for PRN position on Tuesday, so if that is a good deal, I'm taking it. I just didn't want the headache of developing new relationships with co-workers, patients etc.. (Since it is only for a short time) Oh well! Maybe my husband will just tell me to not worry about working for the rest of the summer!

If it's a temp job, go for it if you and your husband agree. It definitely could not hurt to have that type of experience and could only help if somewhere on down the line you get the itch to do it permanently.

beware of this company, outcomes, inc (out of virginia), which performs hedis reporting using odis. goes by either http://ky.my-odis.com/about.jsp or http://www.outcomesinc.com/employment.asp.

i worked for this company for 2 months, using my own resources for such items as: gas, paper, ink, phone calls, faxing, postal, etc. and did not get paid for the majority of time i spent working. i would call daily, keeping in touch w/my field representative, as instructed. i would perform all aspects of the job as outlined in the job description, only to find out someone else would go into the paperwork i sent via computer, and change the information. i would be sent to md offices which would be closed; sent to offices which only had 2 charts out of 30 available; sent to offices which had "hybrid" charts, meaning the field reviewer had to collect both electronic & paper information (this can add an additional day to your one day schedule, and your not paid anything extra for the time, effort, resources used). finally told them i was resigning due to my outgoing expenses, not being paid, company not fulfilling their part of the contract.

in total, this job cost me approx. $1000 in 2 months, whereas, i was paid only $60.00 for the initial training. i in turn, did not return their laptop

nor their scanner. i have kept the lines of communication open w/this company, trying to get the money owed to me, after which, their equipment would be returned. received an e-mail from them stating if their equipment was not returned, they would be contacting my state nursing board to make a complaint against me. today, i just received my w-2 from this company, reporting they paid me $800.00.

needless to say, shot off another e-mail to them to either pay me, or fix this w-2. one last thing, when i did report i was quitting, they did offer to pay me $30.00/hr vs. $4.00/chart. so, if one does foolishly apply to this company, demand an hourly pay vs. per chart.

Wow....the posts here surprise me. I have been doing chart reviews for several companies for years. The PER CHART pay is the best, as I can do 7-10 an hour, sometime more. I end up making $60+an hour. My gas is always reimbursed at about .51 cents per mile which is WAY more than you actually spend. The last assignment I did, I worked about 20-30 hours a week, on my own schedule, for 6 weeks. I made $11,000 including the per chart pay, the bonus, and the gas money.

These are quite legitimate jobs....it's laughable that everyone is asking "is this for real"? You are looking for info such as "The last B/P in 2010". How hard is it to find that? It's easy, which is why you are doing many charts an hour.

These jobs pay amazingly well. Never worked for Outcomes specifically, but I have worked for others.

I am responding to this post which was originally written in 2008 because I want some correct information to be in the post.

Cindyone-

I'm desperately trying to get away from floor nursing...

Can you tell me what company you worked for? How does one get into this type of work? Are they usually short-term positions?

Thanks!

Well, first let me say that these companies typically only offer work for 3 months of the year. All of the nurses I've done chart reviews with, including myself, have "hoped" they would have more work, but they don't.

I have found one company that I'm working for now though that says they will have big projects coming up....but so far I am getting 3 hours a week or less....so it's very "per diem". But keep reading below because there is opportunity with one company for full time work

Q Mark Inc, out of Englewood Co, does the HEDIS reviews where I made $5.75 per chart. They are disorganized, but seem to pay the best. This last assignment they refused to pay for paper....which the offices often demand that you reimburse to them. I told them that I would no longer work for them since they refused to pay for the paper. Actually, the paper only cost me $10; so that wasn't really worth leaving them for; it was mostly due to their disorganization. They hire "best friends" to be project managers, instead of hiring people who are qualified. Our project manager cost us so much work and aggravation because she didn't know what she was doing. But hey....if I were telling you to go with a particular company, I would tell you to work for Q Mark. Several of us just finally got fed up and said "we're done with this company". That doesn't mean that it wouldn't be a good place for many of you to get started, especially since i've heard they pay the best, and pay better than Outcomes. So, definitely, I recommend Q mark inc. for doing the HEDIS reviews. You can find their website and apply right now and you'll be called for work next November for the HEDIS reviews in the spring.

Outcomes, as mentioned in another post. Haven't worked for them, but I would disagree with some of what the other poster said. Yes, you go to offices that are closed. You just go on to the next one. You should be paid your gas, but she is saying that Outcomes did not pay her (which is bad). Yes, you must get both paper and EMR charts. Theres nothing wrong with that. Doesn't take ay extra time....just takes the time it takes. You are being PAID to review the charts whether they are written on Paper, are on EMR, or are written in gold on Papyrus scrolls. Dont' know why the other poster thought this was so awful. It's a normal part of the job. You should NEVER keep a laptop, as they WILL WIN as you have signed a contract saying you will return it or pay for it. And yes, sometimes you go in expecting 30 charts but there are only 5. Most of the time you will welcome that, as you have a full day scheduled and now you can breathe easier. Whether they truly didn't pay the poster below, or whether the poster did not get paid because she didn't finish the contract, I don't know. Since she's complaining of all the things that are "typical" of the job, it makes me think she just didn't understand it. And to hold a laptop "hostage" thinking that would get her her money was very immature. You can never win against a huge corporation. They will ALWAYS win. You can only really "vote with your feet" by leaving.

MedAssurant is the new company I am working for. They do HEDIS reviews also, but I haven't worked with them on HEDIS yet. MedAssurant does have full time work in every large city but like any other, if the positions are filled you will only be allowed to do do per diem. I saw an ad to do "a 24 hour job", and being desperate I took it. There was a week of training to do coding reviews as that is what they needed. Then my 24 hours was really just a couple hours a week, spread out over weeks. They have full time workers here in town, and I hope to work there, but may never get a chance to. Right now, they are just per diem until their bigger projects come around.

Also, these companies start hiring in Nov for the March-May HEDIS jobs. So look in Craigslist and Careerbuilder then. They advertise for Nurse Auditors/Reviewers. You can also sign up ahead of time. And to look for other companies doing this work, do searches on HEDIS. You can also search Nurse Auditor, Nurse Reviewer, Data Abstraction, Nurse Abstractor....on job sites now.

So, as you can see, except for MedAssurant, these companies don't have work year round. The other nurses that do these jobs are typically nurses who do per diem at other places, and then they reserve March-May for the HEDIS reviews.

MedAssurant is the one to contact for possible full time work. They will train you.

As an aside...if you can stand the coding review (which is what i'm doing at MedAssurant)....and can get some experience....you CAN take a serious coding certification exam that will cost you about $1000 altogether including your books, and then you can do coding reviews on a contract basis from home. Like anything, it gets easier with time. They recommend you dont take the test until you have at least 2 years of experience under your belt, and I can see why. But you won't get that unless you are specifically hired by a hospital to do coding or coding reviews. But if you want, you could do the coding reviews part time with MedAssurant, study the books on your own and take the test if you feel inclined. For those that are desperate enough to get out of patient care it is something to think about (I feel your pain!) Once you are certified you are good to go to work in hospitals as coders and coding reviewers also. But USUALLY the experience comes before the certification....but hey, maybe you could do it backwards, I don't know.

To read about the test and the certification go here:

http://www.aapc.com/certification/cpma.aspx there is coding and auditing certification

http://www.namas-auditing.com/Namas This is the national board for auditing

When I say it costs $1000, I mean the test is $300 by itself, but there is 1 week's training for the test is $1000 and includes your test. If you wanted to go that route....but the people taking that 1 week course have been coders for years.....

Anyway, i know many of you are desperate like me for work, as well as some of you are desperate to leave patient care (one of you wrote me a private message, but when I tried to answer there was an error and I could'nt respond so I'm just responding here)

Good luck.

I responded below....sorry, I'm not used to this forum thing so wanted to make sure you got my reply below....

Starting Medassurant Monday (training). Can you who have experience with this company PM me please? I have lots of questions.

Thanks

What is it exactly that you trained for first with Medassurant? I think I was told I could learn coding or Hedis later, so what is it I'm training for for a week then, do you know? I PM'd you. Are you both cindyone and cindyabernathy?