The DOI matches its Crossref record; 10 of the 12 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Enhancing Financial Performance: An Application of Lean Six Sigma to Reduce Insurance Claim Denials
Abstract
Health systems typically lose approximately 3% to 5% of net revenues annually due to insurance claim denials. While most denials can be appealed, the administrative burden of sorting through and appealing them can be time consuming and delays the revenue collection process. This article describes how the Lean Six Sigma methodology was used to improve the revenue cycle by reducing insurance claim denials for a leading pediatric hospital in the United States. The use of this approach is demonstrated through a case example focused on reducing denials by improving the hospital's Emergency Center registration process. Multiple pilot tests were performed to ensure the proposed changes sufficiently addressed the problem of missing/incomplete insurance information. Results indicated that the revised registration form reduced missing/incomplete fields by 67%. As a result, the revised form was implemented, which helped greatly reduce insurance claim denials. In addition to providing an example from which other health systems can learn to successfully implement Lean Six Sigma to enhance the performance of their revenue cycle, this work helped the hospital in which this research was performed improve its patient experience by making it easier for patients to complete their Emergency Center registration form.
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“development and standardization of documents [29,50,51,52,53]”
From Lean Healthcare Tools for Processes Evaluation: An Integrative Review. (2021) · cites this paper as [53]
Citations
Cites
Six Sigma: Definition and underlying theory⋆
Schroeder, R. G., Linderman, K., Liedtke, C., & Choo, A. S. (2008) · Journal of Operations Management · doi:10.1016/j.jom.2007.06.007 · Cited by 868
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Carboneau, C., Benge, E., Jaco, M., & Robinson, M. E. (2010) · Journal for Healthcare Quality · doi:10.1111/j.1945-1474.2009.00074.x · Cited by 76
Trzeciak, S., Mercincavage, M., Angelini, C., Cogliano, W., Damuth, E., Roberts, B. W., Zanotti, S. L., & Mazzarelli, A. J. (2016) · Journal for Healthcare Quality · doi:10.1097/jhq.0000000000000075 · Cited by 43
Transforming the Patient Care Environment with Lean Six Sigma and Realistic Evaluation
Black, J. (2009) · Journal for Healthcare Quality · doi:10.1111/j.1945-1474.2009.00028.x · Cited by 38
Six Sigma can meet your revenue-cycle needs.
Samuels, D. I., & Adomitis, F. L. (2003) · PubMed · Cited by 10
Light at the end of the tunnel for denials management.
Waymack, P. M. (2004) · PubMed · Cited by 2
Improving denials management at the enterprise level.
Jones, R. (2015) · PubMed · Cited by 1
Harris, D., Cibenko, A., Johnston, S., Kline, L. J., & Silveria, R. (2002) · PubMed · Cited by 1
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- Burns, 2016, Reducing administrative write-offs through improved denial management, Healthc Financ Manage, 70, 30
- Holyoak, 2017, Rethinking denial management, Health Manage Technol, 38, 20
Cited by
Johnson, M., Albizri, A., & Harfouche, A. (2023) · Information Systems Frontiers · doi:10.1007/s10796-021-10137-5 · Cited by 88
Lean Healthcare Tools for Processes Evaluation: An Integrative Review.
de Barros, L. B., Bassi, L. D. C., Caldas, L. P., Sarantopoulos, A., Zeferino, E. B. B., Minatogawa, V., & Gasparino, R. C. (2021) · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · doi:10.3390/ijerph18147389 · Cited by 90
Implementing Lean Six Sigma in health care: a review of case studies
Samanta, A. K., Varaprasad, G., & Gurumurthy, A. (2022) · International Journal of Lean Six Sigma · doi:10.1108/ijlss-08-2021-0133 · Cited by 41
Sarmiento, L. H. T., Escobar-Rodríguez, L. Y., Gomez-Avila, F. L., & Sánchez, D. T. P. (2024) · Cogent Engineering · doi:10.1080/23311916.2024.2411857 · Cited by 40
Rifqi, H., Díez, I. D. L. T., Montero, E. C., & Alvarado, E. S. (2024) · IEEE Access · doi:10.1109/access.2024.3400166 · Cited by 27
Metadata
- Authors
- Kovach, J. V., & Borikar, S.
- Affiliations
- University of Houston (US)
- Corresponding author
- Kovach, Jamison V.
- ORCID
- Kovach, Jamison V.
- Venue
- Quality Management in Health Care
- Published
- 2018-07
- Volume
- 27
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 165-171
- ISSN
- 1063-8628 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2912930408
- Cited by
- 32
- References
- 12
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 3 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 16 · 2021: 3 · 2019: 1
- FWCI
- 1.27
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Quality Management in Health Care (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Healthcare Quality and Management
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Management Science and Operations Research › Healthcare Operations and Scheduling Optimization
- Social Sciences › Business, Management and Accounting › Management Information Systems › Quality and Supply Management
- Keywords
- insurance denials, Lean Six Sigma, hospital revenue cycle, children's hospitals, patient experience
- MeSH terms
- Emergency Service, Hospital, Humans, Insurance Claim Review, Insurance, Health, Pilot Projects, United States, Efficiency, Organizational, Quality Improvement
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Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.