4. Working with Families and Patients
4.1. Introduction: Partner, a Family Billing System
Partner is a family billing system. It stores information about every patient, but it also stores a database of accounts, or "families." A family account may be the custodian of the patient, the bill-payer for the patient (the "guarantor"), or both. For example, three siblings may all have one family account serving as both guarantor and custodian. That family account will be listed in Partner under a parent's name. Alternatively, children from a divorced family may have one family account assigned as the guarantor and a different account assigned as the custodian.
It may be helpful to think of Partner as having two giant lists: a list of patients and a list of accounts. You run different programs and reports to look at each list. Patients are linked-up to one or more family accounts, and they can be moved around to different accounts when families change. You schedule an appointment for a patient, but you mail a bill to the guarantor account of that patient.
Partner's Family Editor (fame) and Patient Editor (notjane) programs can handle the many different kinds of families and billing situations your office encounters. In the image below, a list of accounts is on the left-hand side and a list of patients is on the right-hand side. You can see how Partner accounts and Partner patients can be linked together to handle different kinds of families.
As shown above, some patients live with one account but have their bills sent to another family. Tracy Jones lives with her mother Judy, but Mike Jones pays Tracy's medical bills. Junior Jones also lives with Judy, but he is responsible for his own bills and is therefore his own gurantor. Partner can handle all of these situations with ease.
When do you run fame, the Family Editor? If you need to review outstanding balances or the billing history for a family, or if you need to update demographic information, such as addresses or phone numbers, then you need to view an account. Run fame, the Family Editor.
When do you run notjane, the Patient Editor? If you need an immunization record, want to review a patient's major diagnoses, or need to change a patient's age or preferred name, you are going to edit a patient. Run notjane, the Patient Editor.
What About Insurance Policy Information? Although personal bills and billing history are tied to accounts, insurance policies are assigned on a per-patient basis. To access a patient's Insurance Policies screen, run nojane.
When do you run checkin? The checkin program, designed for checking in a patient at the front desk, is also a useful place to review information from both fame and notjane. The checkin program also includes the Insurance Policies screen.
Many Partner users run checkin first and then use function keys from the main checkin screen to run fame and notjane. You may find it easiest to run checkin for most tasks and never run fame or notjane as independent programs.
In the sections below, you will learn how to use fame and notjane to manage accounts and patients. To learn how to check in patients and use the checkin screen to edit accounts and patients, read Patient Check-In (checkin).
4.2. The Family Editor (fame)
4.2.1. Introduction
The Family Editor, fame, manages account information. You can run the Family Editor to add a new family to Partner, update family demographics, or enter notes about the account. You can also review an aged balance summary, run a collection report, generate account form letters, or review an account's transaction history.
Accounts and Patients: All charges in Partner belong to accounts; all billing history is found by reviewing accounts. Use the Family Editor to work with accounts. Medical records, procedures, and diagnoses belong to patients. Use the Patient Editor (notjane) to work with patients.
4.2.2. Quickstart: Run fame, Change Demographic Information
Follow the procedure below to learn the basics of fame.
Run fame
You can run fame from the Partner Windows or by typing fame at a command prompt.
You can also run fame from within other programs, such as checkin. Run checkin for the patient, then press [F3 -- Edit Account]. You can then skip to step #3.
Find an Account
Enter the family's name, or part of the family's name, to search for the account.
You can also search by account number, phone number, or several other criteria. To learn more, read Finding Patients and Accounts.
Make Your Changes
On the first page in fame, you can change the account's basic demographics. Move around the screen by pressing Tab, Enter, or the arrow keys. You can also move back one field by pressing the Backspace key. If you wish, you can press Page Down to cycle through all the pages of fame.
Once you have moved the cursor to a field you wish to change, press the End key to automatically erase the current contents.
Press [F1 -- Save]
Press F1 to save your changes and quit. If you do not want to save your changes, press F12 instead.
In the procedure above, you ran fame and made a small change to an account's demographics. In the next sections, you will learn about each of the screens in the fame program. Each of them serves an important purpose.
4.2.3. Page 1: Demographics
On the first page of fame, the main demographics screen, you can view and change demographic and other miscellaneous information about an account. You can also run two very useful account reports.
The fields at the top of the screen are self-explanatory. Press Enter or Tab to move from field to field and fill in any of the basic information. Partner will automatically capitalize names for you and enter dashes (-) in the phone numbers if you do not.
Status Flags: The "Status" field is not like other fields. Statuses are used to "flag" or classify accounts. You can put several different status flags on an account, separated by commas. An account might have "Overdue," "Bad Debt," and "Collection" status flags. Your office can run reports to see all the families that have a status. The status flags show up in the scheduler and elsewhere in Partner so your office will always know if there are any special circumstances surrounding an account.
Look-Up Fields: In all Partner programs, some fields have a list of possible answers from which you can pick. You can type anything you want into a name field or address field, but the "Status" field can only be filled from a list of predefined values, just like medical procedures elsewhere in Partner. To see a list of possible answers in a "Look-Up" field, type an asterisk (*) and press Enter. You can learn more about using the asterisk key to search for options in the Charge Posting manual.
Zip Code City Look-Up: If you type a zip code into the "City" field, Partner will look up the city name for you. Press Enter until the cursor is in the "City" field, type in the five digit zip code, and press Enter or Tab to perform the look-up.
Customizable Fields: The six fields in the lower left quarter of the screen are customizable. Your office may have set these fields to record HIPAA information, social security numbers, or other data.
Billing and Budget Information: In the lower-right quarter of the page, you can view the account's "Last Service" date, the last date on which charges were posted for a patient on the account. Payment and billing dates are also listed. Partner tracks and maintains these dates automatically. The last two fields on the screen, "Hold Bill Till" and "Budget Amt," can be used to control when the family will receive a personal bill and what amount will be due. You can learn more about family billing options by reading Personal Billing and Collections.
Aged Balances: Does the account or their insurance company have any outstanding bills? You can review outstanding balances in an aged chart at the bottom of the screen. The Personal, Insurance, and Medicaid totals will give you a quick reference, but you can also see how old the balances are by number of days since the transaction date (the date of service). Since a charge may become personal only after the insurance company rejects it, a 120+ personal charge may not be as terrible as it looks. However, a large amount of money overdue in the "120+" column might be a red-flag that the account needs attention by a biller. If you want more information about an account's outstanding charges, press [F3 -- Collectn Report].
Address Verification: Insurance carriers will reject claims that have a bad zip code or are missing street or city information. When you edit an account, Partner checks the address and warns you if there is a problem.
Make corrections to the fields that are highlighted in red and press [F1 -- Save and Continue]. If you do not have correct address information, you can press F12 to continue.
Function Keys on the Demographics Page
- [F1 -- Save]
Press F1 to save all changes and quit fame.
- [F3 -- Collectn Report]
Press F3 to run the collection report program. Do you need to understand, in detail, why an account has an overdue balance? The collection report provides a complete record of outstanding charges, including an explanation of which charges are pending the insurance company and which are personal. To learn more about the collection report (coll), read The Collection Report.
- [F5 -- Notes]
Press F5 to jump down to page three of fame, the main notes page. You can accomplish the same thing by pressing Page Down twice.
- [F6 -- Account Forms]
Press F6 to generate a form letter for this account. You will see a list of available form letters:
Use the arrow keys to select the desired letter, mark the letter or letters you want with an X, and press [F1 -- Process Forms]. Some forms will ask you questions on the screen before you print them. Do you want to learn how to create your own form letters or edit the existing ones? Read Customizing Form Letters.
- [F8 -- Account History]
Press F8 to run the Account History report, tater. The Account History report provides you with a complete transaction history for the account, including all dependent patients who have the account as a guarantor and a complete billing history for all insurance companies on the account.
4.2.4. Page 2: Account Dependents Screen
The second page of fame is the dependents screen. It displays all patients related to the account, and contains tools for adding and editing patient information.
The list of family members includes any patients who have this account as either a guarantor, a custodian, or both. The relationship to the patient is described on the left, and the patient's name and birthdate appear on the right. The initial next to the patient's name indiciates their primary care physician, if one is assigned.
Function Keys
- [F1 -- Save]
Press [F1] to save any changes and quit the Family Editor.
- [F5 -- Move Patient]
Press [F5] and select a patient to reassign them to another account.
You will be prompted to find an account and then asked if that account should be the guarantor, custodian, or both for the selected patient.
- [F6 -- Add Patient]
Press F6 to add a patient to the account.
If the patient is not already entered into your system, you can add them during the procedure. After finding or adding the new patient, you will be asked if the current account should be the guarantor, custodian, or both for the patient.
- [F7 -- Edit Patient]
Press F7 and select a patient to run the Patient Editor (notjane) for that patient.
- [F8 -- Edit Policies]
Press F8 and select a patient to view the Insurance Policies screen for that patient.
4.2.5. Pages 3-5: Family Notes Screens
Pages three, four, and five of the Family Editor are notes screens. There are three different types of notes, and each has a screen to itself. They are: regular account notes, the account billing note, and the account copay note.
4.2.5.1. Account Notes
The Account Note screen stores user-entered notes about the family. Every note is saved with the username of the person who entered it along with a creation date and time.
Press [F4 -- Post New Note] to add a note to the account record.
Type your new note and press [F1 -- Save], or press F12 to cancel.
Learn More About Notes: The main notes screen is the same in both the Family and Patient Editors. It includes a follow-up note feature, a search field, and many other features to help you track important information about the patient or family. To learn about these features, read the Structured Notes manual.
4.2.5.2. Account Billing Note
The account billing note will appear on personal bills sent home to this family. If you have a special message for the family that must appear on their personal bill, add it to this page.
Press [F6 -- Modify Note] to change the family billing message. Type the new message and press [F1 -- Save].
If this is the first time you have added a note to this family's bills, you will need to press [F4 -- Post New Note] instead of F6.
| Messages For All Families |
|---|---|
You can also add a message to all personal bills, for all families, or a specific message for current or overdue bills. Read Personal Billing and Collections to learn more. |
4.2.5.3. Account Copay Note
The copay note will appear in the Charge Posting (chuck) program when a patient on this account is checked out. If you need the front desk to review important information before posting a charge for this account, enter the note here.
Press [F6 -- Modify Note] to change the account copay note. Type the new message and press [F1 -- Save].
If this is the first time you have added a copay note for this family's patients, you will need to press [F4 -- Post New Note] instead of F6.
4.3. The Patient Editor (notjane)
4.3.1. Introduction
The Patient Editor (notjane) manages patient information. You can run notjane to add a new patient to Partner, view an immunization record, research visit history, or read about a patient's major diagnoses and allergies.
Patients and Accounts: Medical records, procedures, and diagnoses belong to patients. Use the Patient Editor to work with patients. Charges and billing history, on the other hand, belong to accounts. Use the Family Editor (fame) to work with accounts.
4.3.2. Quickstart: Run notjane, Change Patient Information
Follow the procedure below to learn the basics of notjane.
Run notjane
You can access notjane from the Partner windows or by typing notjane at a command prompt:
You can also run notjane from the main patient demographic screen in checkin. Run checkin for the patient, then press [F2 -- Edit Patient]. You can then skip to step #3.
Find a Patient
Enter the patient's name, or part of the patient's name.
You can also search by chart number, phone number, or several other criteria. To learn more, read Finding Patients and Accounts.
Make Your Changes
On the first page in notjane, you can change the patient's basic demographics. Move around the screen by pressing Tab, Enter, or the arrow keys. You can also move back one field by pressing the Backspace key. If you wish, you can press Page Down to cycle through all the pages of notjane.
Press [F1 -- Save]
Press F1 to save your changes and quit. If you do not want to save your changes, press F12 instead.
In the procedure above, you ran notjane and made a small change to a patient's basic information. In the next sections, you will learn about each of the pages in the notjane program. Each of them serves an important purpose.
4.3.3. Page 1: Demographics
On the first page of notjane, the demographics screen, you can view and change basic information about the patient. You can also change the custodian and/or guarantor account for the patient and run two very useful patient reports (imms and patinfo).
Press Enter or Tab to move from field to field and fill out any of the basic information. Partner will automatically capitalize names for you and enter dashes (-) in the phone numbers if you do not. You can write the birthdate in a condensed format, such as "082401" for August 24th, 2001, and Partner will expand the date for you and calculate the patient's age automatically.
Look-Up Fields. In all Partner programs, some fields have a list of possible answers from which you can pick. You can type anything you want into a name field or address field, but the "Physician" field can only be filled with a provider from your practice. To see a list of possible answers in a "Look-Up" field, type an asterisk (*) and press Enter. You can learn more about using the asterisk key to search for options in the Charge Posting manual.
The primary care "Physician" field and the "Status" field are both look-up fields:
Status Flags. The "Status" field is not like other fields. Statuses are used to "flag" or classify patients. You can put several different status flags on a patient, separated by commas. A patient might have "Needs Extra Time" and "Diabetic" status flags. Your office can run reports to see all the patients that have a particular status. The status flags show up in the scheduler and elsewhere in Partner so your office will always know if there are any special circumstances surrounding a patient.
Four "Extra Information" Fields. There are four fields in the middle of the screen which are customizable. Your practice might use these fields to store additional contact information, nicknames, or important dates.
Guarantor and Custodian. In the middle of the screen, you will see either one or two account. If the same account is both the guarantor and custodian for this patient, one account will appear in the center of the screen:
If one account is the guarantor and a different account is the custodian, two accounts will appear:
When two accounts are shown, the account on the left is the custodian account and the account on the right is the guarantor account.
What is a guarantor, what is a custodian? The custodian is the patient's care-giver and physical address. The guarantor is the bill payer. During the time an individual is a patient at your practice, the guarantor and custodian may change or even switch places! Press [F4 -- Reassign Account] to make changes.
Function Keys on the Demographics Page
- [F1 -- Save]
Press F1 to save all changes and quit notjane.
- [F2 -- Edit Policies]
Press F2 to view the patient's Insurance Policies screen. Read the Insurance Policy Page manual for more information.
- [F3 -- Imms Record]
Press F3 to run the imms program. In imms, you can view the patient's immunization record. Press [F2 -- School Form] to print a nicely formatted immunization record, press F12 to return to notjane.
Read the Edit Immunization Records manual for more information.
- [F4 -- Reassign Account]
Press F4 to change the guarantor or custodian accounts for this patient. You will first be asked which account to reassign:
Next, find the family account:
- [F5 -- Patient History]
Press F5 to run the Patient History (patinfo) program. This program produces two different reports which summarize a patient's visits by date or by diagnosis. For example, a Patient History report could show you every date upon which asthma was used as a diagnosis for the patient.
- [F6 -- Patient Forms]
Press F6 to generate a form letter for this patient. You will see a list of available form letters:
Use the arrow keys to select the desired letter, mark the letter or letters you want with an X, and press [F1 -- Process Forms]. Some forms will ask you questions on the screen before they print. Do you want to learn how to create your own form letters or edit the existing ones? Read Customizing Form Letters.
- [F7 -- Edit Account]
Press F7 to run the Family Editor (fame) for the account(s) connected to this patient. If there are two different accounts related to the patient, you will be prompted to choose whether to edit the Custodian or the Guarantor:
4.3.4. Page 2: Major Diagnoses and Allergies
The second page of notjane contains major diagnoses and allergies for the patient, as well as records of their recent visits to your practice.
You can enter major diagnoses and allergies manually, but Partner will also add entries based on the diagnoses that are posted for the patient.
Appointment Information. Partner will list the next three appointments currently scheduled for the patient. You can also see the total number of appointments, the total number of appointments missed and cancelled, and an explanation of what visits were most recently missed and cancelled. All of this information is maintained automatically by Partner and can not be edited.
More Diagnoses and Procedure Information. For a detailed history of the procedures and diagnoses of this patient, press [F5 -- Patient History] to run the patinfo program.
4.3.5. Page 3: Patient Notes
The third page of notjane is the Patient Notes page. You can store important information and records of interactions with the patient.
Press [F4 -- Post New Note] to begin adding a new note. You will see a text editor window for adding your note:
While typing your note, you can use the various function keys in the text editor to make changes. After typing your note, press [F1 -- Save & Quit]. Press F12 to cancel.
| Learn More About Notes: |
|---|---|
The notes screen is the same in both the Family and Patient Editors. It includes a follow-up note feature, a search field, and many other features to help you track important information about the patient or family. To learn about these features, read the Structured Notes manual. |
4.4. Adding New Patients and Accounts
4.4.1. Introduction
Before patients can be scheduled or procedures can be posted, you need to add the patients and their family account(s) to Partner. This section will guide you through a basic procedure for adding a new patient and a family account. The procedure is simple: try to find the patient, check the new patient list in case they were added earlier today, add the patient, and then add the family if they are new to your practice. Read below to learn the details of each step.
When do you add patients? You might need to add a patient when you try to schedule them and find they are not in your system. Or perhaps you are posting hospital charges for a newborn and know that "Babyboy Smith" has not yet been added to Partner. Whatever job you are performing, you will start by trying to find a patient.
4.4.2. Add a Patient, then Add the Account
Attempt to Find the Patient
Before you can add a patient, you must make certain that the patient is not already in the Partner system. You may already be searching for the patient in checkin, sam, or some other program. If not, run notjane and enter the first few letters of the patient's name. If the patient has already visited your office, they should be in the system.
Check the New List
If the patient was added to the system earlier today, they will be listed on the "New List." Press [F1 -- Check New List] from the search results screen if you can't find the patient:
Press [F1 -- Create Patient]
If the patient does not appear on the New List, and you are satisfied that you searched by the patient's real name, press F1 to begin creating a new patient.
Fill Out Basic Patient Information
Fill in each field, pressing Enter or Tab to move from field to field.
In the "Born" field, you can type the birthdate in many different formats; "082401" will be translated into August 24th, 2001. The "Physician," "Status," and "Referring Physician" fields are look-up fields. In a look-up field, you can use an abbreviation or enter an asterisk (*) to view a list of possible entries.
Follow Your Office's Standards Some medical practices do not assign a primary care physician. Some practices have rules for how to record a patient's full name. Other practices assign certain Status Flags for new patients. You should follow the standards that your practice uses when entering data.
Fill In the Four Custom Boxes
The four boxes below the patient's basic information are customizable. Your office may use them for a special purpose.
Press [F7 -- New Cust Account] to Assign an Account
You must tell Partner who the custodian and guarantor accounts are for this patient. The patient's family account may already exists in Partner, or you may need to create a new family account. In either case, press [F7 -- New Cust Account] to start the process.
Find Existing Account or Add a New Account
Enter the name of the family with which your new patient lives.
If the family already exists in Partner, you will be brought back to the notjane screen and the account you selected will be listed under the "Patient Lives With" and "Send Bill To" sections. If you can not find the account and you need to add it to Partner, press [F1 -- Check New List].
Then, if the account is not on the New List, press [F1 -- Create New Account] just as you did for the patient in the steps above.
Fill Out Account Information
If you are adding a new account to Partner, fill out the family name and basic information.
When you are finished adding account basics, press [F1 -- Save] to save the new account and assign it to your new patient.
Review Custodian and Guarantor, Change if Necessary
After selecting or saving the patient's custodian account, you will return to the notjane screen. You will see your chosen family assigned as both the Custodian and Guarantor account.
If necessary, you can now select a different family as the guarantor account by pressing [F8 -- New Bill Account]. At any time, now or in the future, you can press [F7 -- New Cust Account] to change the patient's custodian family.
Add Other Information
Press Page Down to view the other pages of the notjane program. For example, you can add major diagnoses and allergies as well as any important notes about the patient. You can also press [F2 -- Imms] to enter the patient's immunization history.
Press [F1 -- Save]
Once you are finished entering patient information, press F1 to save and quit. You are now ready to schedule the patient, post charges, or perform other functions.
| Two Methods |
|---|---|
As shown above, you can add a patient and Partner will guide you through adding or selecting the patient's gurantor and custodian accounts as you create the patient. However, if you are entering a whole family that has never before visited your Practice, you may find it faster to add the family account first and add patients during that process. |
4.5. Managing Insurance Policies
4.5.1. Introduction
Your office keeps track of insurance policy information for every patient that walks through your door. Managing those insurance policies is one of the most important functions of Partner. The Insurance Policies screen, available from several different Partner programs, is your one-stop screen for reviewing and changing a patient's insurance information.
4.5.2. Review Insurance Policies
Many Partner programs have direct links to the Insurance Policies screen. For example, if you are at the first checkin screen in Partner, press [F1 -- Check Inscos] or Page Down to review insurance policies for the patient. The Charge Posting (chuck) program and the Patient Editor (notjane) also have links to the policy screen.
To quickly open the policy screen, simply run the Patient Editor (notjane), find a patient, and then press [F2 -- Edit Policies].
Policies are listed briefly at the top of the screen, and the details for the selected policy are shown at the bottom:
Press the up and down arrow keys to select any policy. Once you have selected a policy, full details will appear in the box at the bottom of the screen. If the list of policies is too long to fit on the screen, press [F3 -- Scroll Forward] or [F2 -- Scroll Backward] to review the entire list. Press the right arrow key to view additional plan notes for the selected policy.
When Reading the List of Policies, Remember:
If any subscriber details are blank, such as the name or address, Partner will generate claims using the information from the guarantor account. If the policy holder's address is the same as the guarantor's address, you do not need to re-enter the address on the patient's policy screen.
Unless it is expired, the first policy on the list is the patient's primary insurance. Policies are auto-sorted: expired policies are automatically moved below active policies, and Medicaid policies appear below active non-medicaid policies. You can arrange your active policies to set the primary and secondary insurances by selecting a plan and pressing [F6 -- Move Policy].
 | You should never delete an old, expired policy. There may still be outstanding balances due that company, or you may later need to know previous plan information for a patient. Instead, insert a new policy at the top of the list and expire the old policy. |
4.5.3. Make Changes
You can edit, add, move, delete, or expire an insurance policy with a few, quick keystrokes. While inserting a new policy, you also have the options to copy a recently edited policy or automatically add the new plan to the record of any siblings or family members. When expiring a policy, you will have the opportunity to expire the same plan for all patients in the same family.
The function keys for each task are self-explanatory:
Select a policy on the screen using the arrow keys, press the appropriate function key, and follow the prompts on the screen. The more detailed instructions in the sections below will guide you through each task.
4.5.3.1. Add a Policy
When a patient's insurance information changes, you need to add a new plan to their list of policies. You should do this before posting charges for the patient. Otherwise, the procedures may be billed to the wrong carrier or with the wrong information.
Follow this procedure to add a policy:
Press [F1 -- Insert Policy]
A new line will appear at the top of the list of insurance policies, and blank fields will appear at the bottom of the screen.
Enter Policy Information
Enter policy information in the blank fields.
Keep In Mind:
Looking Up the Insurance Company: For the Insurance Company field, you can use an asterisk (*) to search through your practice's list of plans. For example, entering *BCBS* would show you a list of BCBS insurance plans. Depending on how your office tracks insurance companies, typing *4624* may show you all insurances with a P.O. Box of 4624, a handy shortcut.
Override Fields: When generating claims, Partner will use the guarantor's name, address, and relationship as recorded in the fame and notjane programs. If the insurance policy holder is not the guarantor, you should fill out the name, relationship, and address fields shown above.
Effective Dates: The effective dates are very important. Partner chooses which insurance company to bill based on the effective dates. You can leave the date fields blank, but Partner will then assume that the insurance plan has always been valid and that the coverage has no known expiration.
Press [F1 -- Save]
As soon as you press F1, the new policy will be saved and active for this patient.
Optional: Copy the New Policy to Related Patients
If the new policy is not a Medicaid policy, and the patient has relatives in your system that share the same guarantor, Partner will next ask whether you wish to add the new policy to the patient's siblings. A sibling is any patient who shares a guarantor with the current patient.
Press [F1 -- Copy Policy] to continue to the sibling screen, press [F4 -- Do Not Copy] or F12 to continue without modifying sibilings.
On the sibling selection screen, confirm the position (primary, secondary, etc.) of the new plan and update any differences to the certificate and group numbers for each patient.
Press [F1 -- Save] to add the plans to the sibling records.
If you do not wish to copy the new policy to any of these patients, press F12.
Review Your Changes
Finally, you will be returned to the main policy screen. After adding a new policy, you should review all active insurance policies for the patient. Is the primary insurance listed first? Do you need to expire an old policy? Use the function keys at the bottom of the screen to make any further changes to the patient policy record.
4.5.3.2. Copy a Policy
When adding a new policy, you may wish to copy insurance plan information from a recently edited policy elsewhere on the account. If you recently added or edited a policy for some other patient on the family, you can automatically import the entire plan to this patient's policy record.
Follow this procedure to copy the family's most recently edited policy:
Press [F1 -- Insert Policy]
A new line will appear at the top of the list of insurance policies, and blank fields will appear at the bottom of the screen.
Press [F5 -- Use Last Modified]
This family's most recently edited policy is shown in the middle of the screen. Press F5 to copy that policy's details into the new policy fields at the bottom of the screen.
The blank fields will be filled out with all available information from the most recently edited policy.
Enter or Change Policy Information
Update any information that is different for the current patient, such as the insurance certificate number.
Press [F1 -- Save]
As soon as you press F1, the new policy will be saved and active for this patient.
Optional: Copy the New Policy to Related Patients
As with the insert policy procedure, you will now be offered the option of adding the policy to the record of other patients who share the same guarantor account.
Press [F1 -- Copy Policy] to continue to the sibling screen, press [F4 -- Do Not Copy] or F12 to continue without modifying sibilings.
On the sibling selection screen, confirm the position (primary, secondary, etc.) of the new plan and update any differences to the certificate and group numbers for each patient.
Press [F1 -- Save] to add the plans to the sibling records.
If you do not wish to copy the new policy to any of these patients, press F12.
Review Your Changes
Finally, you will be returned to the main policy screen. After adding a new policy, you should review all active insurance policies for the patient. Is the primary insurance listed first? Do you need to expire an old policy? Use the function keys at the bottom of the screen to make any further changes to the patient policy record.
4.5.3.3. Expire a Policy
When you add a new insurance policy to a patient, you will usually expire an old policy. When you expire an insurance policy, you will also be given the option to expire the same policy for all patients with the same guarantor.
When you wish to expire a policy, follow this procedure:
Select the Policy You Want to Expire and Press [F6 -- Expire Policy]
Enter the End Date
Yesterday's date will be entered automatically in the "End Date" field for the policy. You can enter a different date, indicating when the policy expires. The end date is the last date on which the selected policy should be billed for new charges.
Press [F1 -- Save]
Press F1 to save the policy's end date and expire the policy.
Optional: Expire Policy for Patient Siblings
Next, Partner will ask if you wish to expire the same policy for the patient's siblings. A sibling is any patient who shares a guarantor with the current patient.
Press [F1 -- Expire Policy] to continue to the sibling screen, press [F4 -- Do Not Expire] or F12 to continue without modifying sibilings.
On the Expire Policy for Related Patients screen, review the policies for each of the siblings and press [F1 -- Expire Policies] to continue. You can change which policies will be expired by deselecting them or using the selection function keys at the bottom of the screen. Press F12 to cancel and leave the siblings' policies untouched.
Toggle Detail: If you need more information about the listed policies, press [F5 -- Toggle Detail].
You can only expire policies that match the one you just expired. You will not be able to select and expire a sibling's policy unless it uses the same entry in the Insurance Companies table in the Table Editor (ted).
Press [F1 -- Expire Policies] to Expire Selected Policies
Review Your Work: The procedure above will expire a policy for one patient and any related patients you select. Remember, however, that you should always review and update each patient's policy information every time they visit your office.
4.5.3.4. Edit an Existing Policy
You may discover a bad certificate number, or learn that a policy is in a different parent's name and not that of the guarantor account. Follow this procedure to change information about an insurance policy that is already on an account:
First, use the arrow keys to select the insurance policy you need to edit.
Next, press [F4 -- Edit Policy] to make changes. The screen will change to allow editing, and your cursor will move to the "Insurance Company" name field.
Use the Tab, Enter or arrow keys to move to the field that needs to be changed.
When you are finished, press [F1 -- Save] to save your changes. If you make a mistake or choose not to save your changes, press F12.
 | You should never overwrite an existing policy with a new plan, even if only the address or the copay has changed. There may be outstanding charges pending the old policy or you may need to reference the family's insurance history. Instead, use [F5 -- Insert Policy]. You can then press [F4 -- Copy a Policy] to grab the information from the policy you wish to correct. When you finish adding the new plan, use [F8 -- Expire Policy] to expire the changed policy. |
4.5.3.5. Make a Policy Primary or Secondary
When you post charges, Partner pends them to the active insurance policy on the patient's account. But what if the account has more than one active policy? Which policy is the account's primary insurance? Partner will send the charges to the first policy listed on this screen. Therefore, you may need to adjust the order of the account's active policies. Follow the procedure below.
Select the policy you wish to move. Use the up and down arrow keys to move to the policy.
Press [F6 -- Move Policy]. You will see the screen shown below:
Use the arrow keys to move the policy where you want it. The screen will update as you move it, showing you the result of the move.
When you are finished, press [F1 -- Save] to save your changes. If you make a mistake or choose not to save your changes, press F12.
4.5.3.6. Delete a Policy
Under rare circumstances, you may need to delete a policy from an account. If any charges have been posted while a policy is active, you should not delete that policy. If you have added the wrong plan to the wrong account, however, or the account never should have had a certain policy, you can do the following to remove it:
Use the up and down arrow keys to select the offending policy.
Press [F7 -- Delete Policy]. You will see a warning screen.
Press [F8 -- Delete] if you are certain you want to delete the selected policy. If you change your mind and wish to keep the selected policy, press F12. Once deleted, there is no way to "undelete" a policy.
4.5.4. Policy Logs (policylog)
The Policy Log (policylog) program displays a log of all changes made to a patient's insurance policy record.
When an insurance policy is added, edited, deleted, or moved, Partner records that action, the time and date it was performed, and the user who made the change. If an insurance policy was accidentally deleted or changed, you can run policylog to review the patient's past insurance records. You can also review exactly when a policy was added to a patient's record, which may help explain a billing problem.
How Far Back? PCC created the policylog program in the spring of 2007. If you need help researching policy changes made before your Partner 3.2007 update, contact PCC support.
4.5.4.1. Running Policy Log
There are two ways to run policylog:
You can run policylog while viewing a patient's policies. First, press the right arrow key:
Next, press [F4 -- Policy Log].
You can also run policylog as a stand-alone program, either from a command prompt or from a custom entry in your Partner Windows. Contact PCC Software Support for more information.
4.5.4.2. Reading Policy Log
The policy log is a list of entries that describe changes made to a patient's policy record. The entries are displayed in reverse-chronological order, with the most recent changes listed at the top.
You can press Page Down and Page Up to scroll through the entries page-by-page, or press the down and up arrow keys to scroll through the list one line at a time.
Each entry in the log describes one action. For each action, policylog displays a header with the user who made the change, the date and time the change occurred, and a description of the change.
The header shown above indicates that the user "guest1" added a new primary policy on Friday, April 6th, at 5:37pm.
The body of each entry shows the details of the policy affected by the change.
The primary policy that guest1 added was a BCBS policy with a $15 copay.
More Complex Changes: When a plan is moved or modified in some way, the body of the entry will include a "Before and After" section to show the change that was made:
In the example above, guest1 changed the certificate number on the BCBS plan from 333333333 to 444444444. The policy's start date was also changed from 1/01/2007 to 3/01/2007.
Modified or Expired? Policy expiration is shown in policylog with a "MODIFIED" header. When you expire a policy, policylog records that as a modification.
4.5.4.3. Searching for Policy Information
If a patient's insurance record has been changed several times, it can be difficult to find specific information. Press [F8 -- Search Pattern] to perform a search.
After typing a search term, press Enter. The results of your search will be highlighted and the screen will automatically scroll to the first search result.
Press [F7 -- Search For Next] to jump to the next result.
4.5.4.4. Conclusion
By researching a patient's policylog record, you can recover lost insurance information, discover insurance updating problems at your practice, and improve communication in your office. Contact PCC Support at (800)-722-1082 or <support@pcc.com> if you have any questions.
4.5.5. Conclusion
Good insurance tracking means fewer billing and collection problems. Partner's Insurance Policies screen will help you quickly and accurately track insurance information for each patient. If you have any questions, concerns or suggestions, please let us know at 1-800-722-1082.