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Medical billing in the US, unlike regular billing, is governed by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996. The act mandates that all medical institutes that deal with patients must send and record all billings electronically. This is where medical billing software comes in handy.

Generally medical billing software is designed to be used by doctors, medical institutes, and medical secretaries, medical billing services, insurance companies – anyone who needs to generate a medical bill or claim. Medical billing software need to be HIPAA ready.

Medical billing software is designed to work will popular platforms like windows and make it easy to generate bills through automated billing systems programmed within, cutting down time and mistakes in generating electronic bills.

The medical billing software is aimed at helping the care providers by making the billing process easier. Medical billing software is proven to improve the quality of billing and claims. Some medical billing software’s are also customized to generate claims for insurance companies using the same HIPAA guidelines. Medical billing software is also customized for different medical practices like dentists and chiropractors etc.

Some medical billing software also comes with direct emailing features which allow the user to generate and send the emails using the same software. Additional features can include data entry, generating and printing the data in report form, scheduling appointment and tasks within the billing software etc.

Additionally, even before generating the electronic billing, the medical service provider is required to check on patient records online to see if their insurance covers the medical services requested. This data request is known as Health Care Eligibility & Benefit Inquiry transaction. The response returned to such a request is called the "Health Care Eligibility & Benefit Response transaction. These transactions use something called practice management software.

Practice management software (PMS) is medical billing software that is used to manage the every-day operations of a medical practice – like recording patient data, scheduling appointments, maintain insurance information in addition to billing. Medical billing software like PMS are designed specifically for small or medium sized institutes and come in desktop, client server or internet based versions. Desktop based medical billing software requires licensing fees as they need to be bought.

Some of the top medical billing software in use right now are-

• Medisoft, which is so commonly used that it is even used in medical billing training schools. This medical billing software generates invoices, tracks payments and also alerts if payments are late etc. This medical billing software can also send periodic bills or statements.

• Lytec is also medical billing software that is used in medical billing training. Apart from the basic billing management, this software also features insurance claims management and the patient database encryption.

• Medinotes is a more basic medical billing software which acts as a database for patient record.

• NueMD is a web based multipurpose medical billing software which also allows the user to submit claims and check patient eligibility online.

 

• eClinicalWorks is a more comprehensive medical billing software then any of the others and is used by larger organizations mainly. Apart from the basic billing functions, and most of the features mentioned in the softwares mentioned above, this medical billing software also allows medical institutes to network using its interface, making it easy to access and transfer data between various concerns instantly.