Financial Assistance and Support for Patients

March 28, 2025

by Noman Tariq Healthcare

Bearing healthcare expenses in the US is overwhelming and considering the rising inflation, it has become impossible to survive without solid financial backup. Patients without financial assistance can face extreme situations and often many of them do not get the essential treatment due to lack of funds.

However, medical practitioners can make this trouble go away by educating and offering financial assistance and support for patients. This guide will walk you through the significance of financial assistance in healthcare and guide providers on how they can assist patients through support programs.

Understanding Charity Care and Sliding Fee Scales in Healthcare

Before indulging in the depths of financial assistance, it is imperative to understand the concept of charity care and the sliding fee scale in healthcare. If you’re someone looking to get or provide financial assistance, there’s a dire need to understand the meanings first.

Note: Key Difference

To avoid confusion, here is the key difference between Charity Care and Sliding Fee Scale

Charity Care: Offers free or major discount on overall medical services
Sliding Fee Scale: Medical services are discounted and vary from patient to patient depending on their financial condition.

1. Charity Care

As the name suggests “Charity” is something that is offered for free of cost. Similarly, in the healthcare sector, the term charity care is offering free health facilities to people who cannot afford it.

Similarly, charity care also helps people who cannot pay completely. It reduces the medical cost to a major extent and offers discounted prices against all the required treatments.

How it Works?

Charity Care requires a list of inquiries to see who is eligible. It typically includes household income, tax returns, number of family members, and insurance status (if any).

Charity care creates a huge difference for people unable to bear medical expenses either partially or completely. By evaluating all the above assessments, one can avail of charity care.

2. Sliding Fee Scale

Sliding fee scale unlike charity care, does not waive off medical expenditures completely, instead, it offers customized cost solutions to patients. Usually, a sliding fee scale program is suitable for patients looking for affordable options. People who are willing to pay but cannot afford to get discounted prices in this option.

For instance, a patient with a low income will get to pay low than someone with a higher income. Once done with income documentation, the charges will be adjusted accordingly.

How to Guide Patients Through Financial Assistance Options

Patient financial responsibility is real and healthcare providers can ease the financial burden of patients by guiding them to avail of financial assistance from various options. This will not only help patients to overcome their fear of trouble but also help medical providers thrive in the long term.

Below is a step-by-step guide to evaluate the right assistance program for patients, so they can get the most out of available resources.

1. Conduct Screening

The first step is to see who needs help. This is done by conducting initial screening when the patient walks in. Begin with financial queries like income and insurance status to identify needy patients.

2. Assess Eligibility

The following step is to assess patient’s eligibility which can be evaluated based on initial screening. This step will help providers observe which financial assistance will fit best for the patient such as charity or slide fee reduction.

3. Explain Options

Next, discuss all the available options at hand with the patient. Since most patients are unaware, enlighten them with various programs being offered like government aid, charity assistance from non-profit organizations, slide fee reduction, etc.

4. Assist with Documentation

Some of the assistance programs require certain documents as procedural requirements including place of residency, income statements, and tax returns. Help the patients with all the formalities and assist them with proper documentation.

5. Help in Process

Applying for financial assistance can be daunting for patients as the procedures are overwhelming. Further, most of the programs have digital submissions that become hard for the applicants.

Offer personal assistance to patients will all the applications and online forums to reduce their stress.

6. Follow Up-Financial Assistance Program

After concluding all the guidance, follow up with the patient to see if they require any further assistance. This will help patients apply effectively and strengthen the trust bond with health care providers.

Creating a Financial Assistance Program for Your Practice

Are you a healthcare provider? Create a financial assistance program for your practice and enjoy the following benefits.

1. Build Trust

Effective financial assistance will create a sense of trust between patients and health providers leading to overall professional goodwill.

2. Patient’s Satisfaction

Nothing is more beneficial than a satisfied patient. Patients if taken care of accurately, will lead to positive feedback and more recommendations.

3. Attract More Audience

Speaking of recommendation, healthcare professionals will attract more people due to effective financial assistance programs.

4. Stable Cash Flow

One of the greatest benefits of offering financial assistance in your practice is having a stable financial system. By offering the Sliding Fee Scale you will ensure some contributions from patients leading to improved revenue cycle management (RCM)

5. Tax Benefits

Not only you’ll get stable cash flow, but you’ll also qualify for many tax exemptions as well.

Wrap Up

Financial assistance and support are no less than a blessing for patients struggling to meet ends. It not only helps them in times of crisis but also creates awareness for others to prevent emergency care.

As a medical healthcare provider, you can create a difference by offering financial assistance programs in your practice and Xybermed can help you with that. Not only you will feel a sense of fulfillment but you will also enable yourself to have many thriving opportunities ahead.

Medicare’s 8-Minute Rule Explained

March 17, 2025

by Noman Tariq Medical Billing

Are you a therapist struggling to cope with time-based service codes and the Medicare 8-minute rule? Worry no more, our billing specialists at XyberMed have put together this detailed guide to help you master it with ease!

In this guide, we’ll break down the Medicare 8-minute rule, its application, and walk you through examples where it’s applied. We’ve even given you a Medicare 8-minute rule chart to simplify your math and prevent errors when reporting therapy services.

Let’s dive right in then.

Understanding the Medicare 8-Minute Rule

The Medicare 8-minute rule is administered by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and is applicable to the application of all time-based CPT codes, particularly in outpatient care like physical therapy.

Adopted in 2000 after it was initially launched in 1999, this regulation allows healthcare professionals to charge one service unit if they engage in at least 8 minutes of direct one-to-one interaction with the patient. One service unit is 15 minutes of therapy, and additional units are charged proportionately.

How to Calculate Billable Units Using the 8-Minute Rule

Providers must properly bill services under the 8-minute rule by breaking down the overall treatment duration and dividing it among billable units. Two of the most common methods are

The 8-Minute Rule Method – Divide the minutes of service by 15. The integer is the fully billable units and the remainder determines the additional units based on the 8-minute rule.
The “Start with Eight” Technique – One unit for 8-22 minutes of treatment, two units for 23-37 minutes, three units for 38-52 minutes, etc.

When does the Medicare 8-Minute Rule apply?

Here are some real-life examples of the 8-minute rule used in different therapy scenarios:

1. Auditory Processing Assessment

Suppose the 10-year-old is undergoing assessment for suspected auditory processing disorder. The healthcare provider conducts the initial 60-minute assessment that includes dichotic listening and speech-in-noise testing.

After the initial assessment, the audiologist then takes another 30 minutes (or two units of CPT code 92621) to perform special tests to assess the child’s capacity to process rapid auditory information and to localize sound. Here the Medicare 8-minute rule is applied to CPT 92621.

2. Iont

Let’s take the case of a patient with chronic shoulder pain who undergoes iontophoresis therapy. A physical therapist applies the iontophoresis device to the patient’s shoulder for 20 minutes while closely watching and readjusting the current as needed. Here, the therapist bills one unit of CPT code 97033 according to the Medicare 8-minute rule.

3. Aquatic Therapy

If the patient with osteoarthritis of the knee is given 30 minutes of aquatic therapy. During the course of the session, the physical therapist teaches the patient exercises like the range-of-motion exercises, lifting of the leg, and walking while in the water. Since the therapy is 30 minutes long, the provider charges two units of CPT code 97113 based on the Medicare 8-minute rule chart presented in this manual.

4. Orthotic Device Training

A physical therapist aids the patient in learning to accommodate a new ankle-foot orthosis (AFO). The patient is instructed in gait training, proper device fit, and donning/doffing the device by the therapist during a 30-minute visit. The practitioner bills two units of CPT code 97760 based on the Medicare 8-minute rule in this scenario.

5. Electroac

The acupuncturist administers electroacupuncture to treat the patient’s chronic neck pain. The practitioner inserts fine needles at specific acupoints on the neck and, with the use of electrical stimulation, administers the patient 20 minutes of treatment. According to the 8-minute rule, the acupuncturist bills one unit of CPT code 97813.

Common errors to avoid

Even the most seasoned providers make mistakes while applying the Medicare 8-minute rule. These are the most prevalent errors to watch out for:

Billing of non-direct services – Billing is done for direct patient contact minutes only.
Misreporting multiple timed services – If multiple therapies are performed during one session, report each of them individually and accurately.
Rounding up in error – You would include only complete 15-minute blocks and follow the 8-minute rule for extra minutes.

Wrapping Up

Let’s recap what we’ve covered so far:

Medicare 8-minute rule as implemented by CMS applies to time-based CPT codes used in outpatient services.

Physicians can charge at least 8 minutes of direct treatment time per unit.

We demonstrated a Medicare 8-minute rule chart and two calculation methods: the ‘long division’ approach and the ‘start with eight’ technique.

The examples utilized in practice included CPT 92621 for auditory processing, CPT 97033 for iontophoresis, CPT 97113 for aquatic therapy, CPT 97760 for training of the orthotic device, and CPT 97813 for

We discussed billing errors and what to avoid to not make them.

Understanding the 8-minute rule simplifies accurate billing and timely reimbursements. But if you are facing challenges with billing time-based service codes, then XyberMed is here to serve you. We provide our professional physical therapy billing services to ensure accurate claims and maximum reimbursement at competitive rates.

Looking for expert assistance? Speak to our billing professionals now!

Financial Assistance for Patients-A Complete Guide for Healthcare Providers

February 25, 2025