Managing 140 to 150 patients per case load

[MoriahRoseRN]

Hello,

I am interviewing for a position at an insurance company. The position is salaried and I was told the average patient load is 140-150 patients. The job entails managing the perinatal to three months postpartum patient. I am not sure what the criteria is for case managing these patients other then they are on medicaid, pregnant or have recently delivered. With the limited knowledge that I have at this time, does this sound unreasonable?

In addition, I will mainly work from home; however, I will be required to go into the office at least twice per week. Furthermore, the job requires that I travel 25% of the time to meet patient's in a public area, hospital or in their home. Btw, I will be relocating from out of state for this job. Any advice is appreciated, thanks.

[MoriahRoseRN]

Anyone!

[JerseyLilly]

Dear MoriahRose,

If this is a Medicaid program, each individual state mandates its protocol. In NJ, Medicaid patients must be seen initially for an onsite visit, then contacted every 90 days by phone, then a 6 month onsite re-assessment followed by another 90 day telephone follow up in between and then by an annual assessment. In addition to these, you may be case managing other services such as ordering DME, or making community referrals, or initiating referrals for other services like PT or ST. I personally, feel that 140-150 persons is alot to comfortably manage. I believe it comes to 140-150 divided by 3 months for a total of 47-50 per month or 10 to 13 visits a week. With travel time, interview time, paperwork time, and other miscellaneous case management duties, this may be a big case load for you. I would see what kind of paper work is actually involved and know your new state's Medicaid guidelines. Hope this helps!

[MoriahRoseRN]

Hi JerseyLilly,

Thank you for the info. I should hear in the next few days more details about the position. I hope to get a better understanding of the workload and the expectations.

[BrewerRN]

I do a similar program, except I am on the pediatric side. 140 to 150 patients seems overwhelming on the surface, but like the previous poster stated, spread out over 30 days, it's not bad. Most of your contact will be over the phone. You will have on average 50 or so to contact per month, depending on the client's status. Your charting will be your most time consuming thing. If you are going to be doing you charting in CMIS, it will take some getting use to, but it is pretty easier once you get the hang of it. Try not to get too hung up on the numbers.