Tag: Lynn Everard
Former provider launches employee newsletter
January 27, 2016HME News Staff
COCONUT CREEK, Fla. - Valumatrix has launched The Fifth Element, a weekly newsletter to help engage employees, it announced Jan. 26. Each month the newsletter will have an overarching theme and each week it will have a different focus, including work, self, family and relationships“At a time when it is getting more and more difficult for companies to raise their prices, productivity improvements are becoming a preferred approach to shoring up the bottom line,” said Lynn Everard, managing...
Managed Care: Survive service agreements
December 22, 2015Lynn Everard
Q. What's the deal with service level agreements?A. Have you ever noticed that with each new cut in reimbursement there are no reductions in the service levels required? Service level agreements or SLAs, are the salt in the open wound known as your profitability. This contradiction between revenue and service requirements is one of the reasons the HME industry needs a new service model.If only healing this wound was as simple as going to the health plan and renegotiating the service level. We won't...
Managed Care: Avoid seller's remorse
November 25, 2015Lynn Everard
A. As an HME provider you know that revenue is critical to your business. You also know that every activity that you or your staff engages in has a cost. Yet while HME providers typically know their product costs down to the penny, activity costs can be quite another matter. So when a new revenue opportunity comes along there is a huge temptation to price to win the business without taking all of one's cost into account. Of course, new business is exciting but that excitement can wear off quickly...
Managed Care: Spread cost reduction
October 22, 2015Lynn Everard
A. Many HME companies still seem to be focused on getting vendors to further reduce product costs. While no one should pay too much, it is important to understand that our success in winning lower product costs is one of the main reasons reimbursement across all fronts has dropped steadily over the past two decades. It is time to start focusing on cost reduction in places that bring those savings to the bottom line without producing corresponding reductions in revenue. Here are some places to look.•...
TIME TO RETHINK THE HME SERVICE MODEL
September 25, 2015Guest Commentary
Back in 1999, as an industry consultant, I wrote a special report for HME News called “Lessons from Polk County.” In 2001, I left home care to re-enter the hospital world. But in May of 2011, I returned to home care as director of procurement at Univita Health, where I served until October of 2014. In January of this year, I re-entered the consulting world through my company Valumatrix, LLC. Today, I see DME companies as heroes in health care who help patients live independently in their...
Managed Care: Locate the haystack
September 25, 2015Lynn Everard
A. Shifts in the market point to continued growth in managed Medicaid. This is the place where most HME providers will need to be prepared to play. So whether you get a direct contract or become part of a network, success requires that your company be built for a managed care world. The following are key elements in being a sustainable HME managed care provider.Cost: We often focus on product costs but this is about operational efficiency and bringing service costs in line with revenue. This includes...
Humility. Passionate commitment. Great achievement.
January 19, 2010Mike Moran
I have been thinking about Dr. Tom Petty off and on for a week or so, ever since I learned that he died on Dec. 12. I didn't know Dr. Petty very well, but we did talk several times by phone, and I always enjoyed those talks. The father of long-term oxygen therapy took LTOT seriously, but not himself.
Every time I called Dr. Petty or he called me, he would say: “Hi, Mike. This is Tom Petty.”
I, of course, called him Dr. Petty. But in his mind, he was Tom.
Joe Lewarski, vice president on...