Method and apparatus for assessing credit for healthcare patients
First Claim
1. A computerized method comprising:
- obtaining initial patient information associated with one or more of a patient and a guarantor of costs, the costs associated with providing healthcare services to the patient;
determining a benefit of obtaining additional information including financial information related to the guarantorweighing the benefit of obtaining the additional information against the cost of obtaining the additional information; and
determining whether to obtain the additional information at least in part based on the weighing, wherein the method is performed by a computing system comprising one or more computing devices.
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Accused Products
Abstract
According to one example embodiment, there is provided a method and an apparatus to evaluate the credit of a healthcare patient. The example embodiment provides methods and computer systems programmed to use multiple variables that are known about a patient prior to a service being rendered to segment the patient population into finer grained groupings. These finer grained groupings allow financial factors, such as a credit score, to be a more accurate predictor. Also, according to another example embodiment, the model is not a generic model for all patients, but the variables and their parameters are specific to a particular healthcare organization'"'"'s or facility'"'"'s patient population. This creates a custom model that further enhances its predictiveness.
247 Citations
20 Claims
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1. A computerized method comprising:
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obtaining initial patient information associated with one or more of a patient and a guarantor of costs, the costs associated with providing healthcare services to the patient; determining a benefit of obtaining additional information including financial information related to the guarantor weighing the benefit of obtaining the additional information against the cost of obtaining the additional information; and determining whether to obtain the additional information at least in part based on the weighing, wherein the method is performed by a computing system comprising one or more computing devices. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
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9. A method comprising:
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determining a probability that patient healthcare service charges will be paid as a function of one or more of patient information and guarantor financial information, wherein the probability is determined as a function of a payment probability model; refining the payment probability model as a function of information including the determined probability and one or more of the patient information, the guarantor financial information, an indication of the source of the financial information, and received patient payment history associated with charges for the patient healthcare services, wherein the method is performed by a computing system comprising one or more computing devices. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11)
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12. A method of selecting a source of financial information, the method comprising:
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receiving first information related to one or more of a patient or a guarantor of costs associated with providing healthcare services to the patient; receiving actual performance data of guarantor collection activity; and selecting a source of financial information as a function of one or more of at least some of the first information and at least some of the actual performance data, wherein the method is performed by a computing system comprising one or more computing devices. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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Specification