On April 29, Health Affairs published a study examining the system of billing third parties for ealth care services.  The authors found that physicians spend 12 percent of their net patient service revenue on adminstrative complexity related to billing.  The authors propose a more streamlined payment model that they project would save physicians and clinical practices $7 billion annually.  

Full report: http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/reprint/hlthaff.2009.0075v1

Blanchfield, Bonnie B., Heffernan, James L., Osgood, Bradford, Sheehan, Rosemary R. and Meyer, Gregg S.  (2010).  Saving billions of dollars—and physicians’ time—by streamlining billing practices.  Health Affairs, 29 (6): Page- 1-7.  10.1377/hlthaff.2009.0075.  http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/abstract/hlthaff.2009.0075?ijkey=xVcU6pFQ1Spvs&keytype=ref&siteid=healthaff.

Authors: Bonnie Blanchfield, James Heffernan, Bradford Osgood, Rosemary Sheehan, and Gregg Meyer.