Retina PractiCare 2.0: Breaking down ASRS’ benchmarking program
Retina PractiCare 2.0 is an ASRS-developed program that aims to help retina practices benchmark financial and productivity metrics. According to a presentation at the 2020 ASRS Virtual meeting by John Thompson, MD retina practices face increasing financial challenges associated with fee reductions, insurance denials, slim profit margins on part B drugs, and increased overhead.
“Many of us are painfully aware the physician payments have not kept up with inflation,” said Dr Thompson.
He explained that retinta practices can be broken down into 2 different business—a service business (think patient exams and procedures) and pharmaceutical sales business (“the profit or loss on selling doctor administered Part B drug to patients,” as Dr Thompson puts it).
Retina PractiCare 2.0 program focuses on the pharmaceutical side, and through the anonymous collection of business financials (practice demographics, revenue expenses and practice metrics), is able to provide benchmarking and comparisons to similar practices.
“The goal is to help practices improve their financial health,” said Dr Thompson during his presentation.
Key points as to why practices should consider utilizing the Retina PractiCare 2.0 program, include:
-Helps practice maintain probability
-Provides an accurate way to compare physician and staff productivity to other practices
-Breaks down profit and loss margins of pharmaceutical sales
-Helps determine the practices value, an especially important metric during venture capital buyouts, sales, or mergers.
Dr Thompson said during beta testing, it took about 4 hours to enter in the data needed from typical financial reports, which would normally be done by a business manager or practice accountant.
Reference
Thompson JT, et al. Retina PractiCare 2.0: Bencmarking Your Practice. Presented at: 2020 ASRS Virtual Meeting.
