Break-Out One
11 am — 12:00 pm
How to Become a POL Consultant

Get success tips from nationally known consultant Sheila Dunn, D.A., MT (ASCP). In this practical, no-holds-barred session, you discover whether you have the entrepreneurial-type personality, the “right stuff” required to make a living as a consultant. Find out what technical skills are required to be a consultant, how to structure your business, and how to market and bill for your services to ensure long-term success. BONUS: Come away with your own customized personality profile indicating areas you need to work on to boost your chances of success.

Break-Out Two
1:00 pm – 4:45 pm
Attend these sessions if you are starting a POL

1:00 pm – 2:15 pm
Case Study: What You Need to Know to Launch a Successful POL

Before you start-up your new POL, get invaluable insight from this successful lab manager who started a POL and has been managing it for 17 years. Beth Schmitt, MT (ASCP), laboratory manager, Brink’s Family Clinic, Princeton, Ind., shares with you her lessons learned and steps that she took to start her lab. Starting with manual white counts and differentials, the POL is now a full service lab offering routine chemistries, CBCs and pro-times along with immunoassays. Hear how she convinced her doctors to increase testing and buy equipment to produce revenue for the office while improving the quality of patient care. Find out how Schmitt has added efficiencies to her lab. The tips you get in this session will help ensure the success of your POL start-up – and give you great ideas to improve an existing lab!

2:15 pm – 2:30 pm
Refreshment Break & Exhibits

2:30 pm – 3:45 pm
Waived, PPM, Moderately Complex or Highly Complex? Guidance to Choose the Option that Offers You the Best Profit Potential

Your new lab could add hundreds of thousands of dollars to your practice’s bottom line, depending upon the decisions you make on the type of lab and the test-category mix you choose. Toni Clinton, PhD (BCLD); MT (ASCP), Assistant Medical Director of Memphis (Tenn.) Pathology Laboratories guides you through the personnel, quality control and instrumentation requirements of each lab category (waived, provider-performed microscopy, moderately complex and highly complex). She demonstrates how to determine the financial impact of each test category on your cost per test and operational costs. Plus, she walks you through several typical start-up POL scenarios to determine which option is the best alternative based on your practice’s needs. BONUS: Take home a handy comparison chart of the pros and cons of the different test categories

3:45 pm – 4:45 pm
Ace that Survey! Tips from a COLA Surveyor on How to Prepare for the Inspection and Get Accredited

Experts predict increased scrutiny in the survey process, following much-publicized lab-related problems (including one in which 2,300 patient results were found to be questionable, resulting in the patients being evaluated and retested). Accrediting organizations, including COLA, and CMS are working to develop better communication standards and a more interactive survey process. Regional COLA surveyor Rebecca L. Kenner, M.T., DLM (ASCP), Sarasota, Fla., brings you up-to-date on the inspection process and CMS policy changes that may affect you. Get time-saving steps to prepare for your next survey and guidance on new regulations that affect method validation, “equivalent QC,” and the results reporting process.

 


7:00 am - 8:15 am
Registration, exhibits and continental breakfast

Join us early to register and mingle with your colleagues and exhibitors while enjoying complimentary Danish, muffins, coffee and tea.

8:15 am – 8:30 am — Welcome and Introduction

8:30 am – 9:30 am
Master Medicare CLIA Regs, Stark Law and Other POL Challenges

Cyril (Kim) M. Hetsko, M.D., FACP, COLA Chief Medical Officer and member of the U.S. Clinical Laboratory Improvement Advisory Committee (CLIAC) gives you an overview of the CLIA regulations for the clinical laboratory, including personnel regulations. Dr. Hetsko discusses the financial and regulatory challenges faced by physicians and staff in establishing a POL, and how waived testing has affected POLs.

9:30 am – 10:45 am
OSHA Compliance: Proven Strategies to Keep Your Lab Safe

OSHA violations can cost your practice hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines – but there are proven steps you can take to protect your POL. Hear OSHA compliance expert Sheila Dunn, D.A., MT (ASCP), president and CEO of Quality America, Asheville, N.C., guide you to prevent OSHA violations. Discover how to prevent common mistakes on containing and disposing of sharps…what to do if OSHA shows up at your door unannounced...how to satisfy OSHA standards for employee education...and more. BONUS: Take home a Sharps Injury Log that meets OSHA standards for reporting exposures.

10:45 am – 11:00 am — Refreshment Break and Exhibits

11:00 am – 12:00 pm
Use Your Proficiency Testing Results to Improve Your Lab Quality Control Program

COLA surveyor Rebecca Kenner explains how to relate your POL’s quality control program to your PT results. Find out what could possibly go wrong with your PT program and how to avoid common mistakes. Take home tips to achieve long-term success with your PT results and record-keeping. Explore ways to get more benefits out of your PT testing program. Discover how PT can assure quality in your waived tests.

12:00 pm – 1:00 pm — Lunch

Lunch is on us! This is a great opportunity to network with your colleagues and mingle with exhibitors

1:00 pm – 2:15 pm
Case Study: Creative Strategies to Increase Revenue in Your Lab

With the Medicare lab reimbursement freeze, you need to find other ways to increase revenue in your lab. Phyllis Oberle, MT (ASCP), lab manager, Dr. John R. Melnick & Associates, Gaithersburg, Md., and technical consultant for Schuyler House, Valencia, Calif., shows you how to think outside the box! Discover her creative strategies that increased revenue in her lab, including running three days worth of quality control while doing five days worth of patient tests (reducing your cost-per-test), bringing in B12 tests to be reimbursed by Medicare, and more. Take home tips you apply immediately in your lab and boost revenues!

2:15 pm – 2:30 pm — Refreshment Break and Exhibits

2:30 pm – 3:45 pm
Polish Your Negotiation Skills and Get Those Lab Tests Reimbursed by Managed Care Plans

Many office-based laboratories are experiencing payment reductions or outright denial for reimbursement from certain managed care organizations (MCOs). Sheila Dunn returns for this session to show you how to locate and understand contract provisions that involve your lab. Identify which clauses are unfavorable and how to change them. You gain skills to negotiate your POL reimbursement with the “ready-aim-fire” approach, using both a letter and formal meeting. Dr. Dunn gives you the tools to get those lab tests reimbursed!

3:45 pm – 4:45 pm
Case Study: 1-2-3 Punch to Fewer Denials, Faster Billing, Improved Reimbursement and Lab Savings

Get proven strategies to improve your POL’s performance from Nanci Morton, CPC, CCP, former director of physician billing services and compliance, Grove Hill Medical Center (70 physicians across 8 locations) in New Britain, Conn. Morton walks you through the key changes she and the laboratory manager implemented to turn around a central physician office lab from a small profit center to generating $1.3 million in gross revenue annually. Find out how Morton was able to reduce denials due to improper diagnoses, prevent doing tests that were not going to be paid, and drastically reduce charge-entry time. Plus, benefit from Morton's lessons learned in purchasing new software.

4:45 pm – 6:30 pm
Wine & Cheese Reception and Exhibits

Take advantage of a great opportunity to network with your peers, meet new people and browse the exhibits! Find out how other physician practices are boosting their lab profitability and see the latest in new lab equipment offerings.

7:15 am – 8:30 am — Exhibits and Continental Breakfast

Join us for Danish, muffins, fresh coffee or tea, and mingle with your colleagues and exhibitors.

8:30 am – 9:30 am — Shop Smart:
The Right Equipment Boosts Your Profits

The right lab equipment for your type of practice can make the difference between profit and loss in a POL. Drawing from her 27 years of laboratory experience, Phyllis Oberle, MT (ASCP), technical consultant, Schuyler House, Valencia, Calif., shows you how to make smart purchasing decisions for big-ticket items in your lab. Discover what you need to boost your earnings – whether your lab is large or small, waived or high complexity.

BONUS: You get two take-home worksheets to apply your new skills right away; and a Comparative Analyzer Form to help you judge one piece of equipment against another. Plus, go home with a Cost Analysis form for Laboratory Information Systems (LIS) to help you determine how much money you would save if you purchased an LIS.

9:30 am – 10:30 am — Beat the Staffing Blues:
How to Find and Retain High-Quality Lab Staff

Recruiting and retaining high-quality lab staff is key to POL success. Diana Mass, MA, CLS, MT (ASCP), Clinical Professor of Hematology and Director of the Clinical Laboratory Sciences Program at Arizona State University, Tempe, and Vice President, Associated Laboratory Consultants, Inc., Scottsdale, Ariz., hands you scores of practical ideas to successfully find the best staff for your POL, develop tools to evaluate staff and help them make the most of their abilities, create a working environment that fosters retention and much more.

10:30 am – 10:45 am — Refreshment Break and Exhibits

10:45 am – 12:00 pm
Capture all the Lab Reimbursement You’re Due:
Current Coding and Billing Guidance to Reduce Denials

The Medicare lab reimbursement freeze makes it even more critical your staff code and bill appropriately to capture all the reimbursement your POL deserves! Already high denial rates for some POL-performed tests could creep even higher in 2005 as the result of new billing opportunities this year. Peggy Pugh, RN, MLT, CPC, CPC-H, ACS-AP, CCP, Health Administration Coordinator, VA Stars & Stripes Healthcare Network 4, Pittsburgh, gives you nuts-and-bolts guidance to prevent common coding problems, including bundling issues with panels that result in denials or reduced payment. For example, Pugh shows specific panels and how certain payer policies can cause problems with denials – and steps to prevent them. Review common National Coverage Decisions (NCDs) and the diagnoses that are allowed and changes to the venipuncture codes that were effective Jan.1. Plus, Pugh shows you how to conduct an internal billing audit for your POL!

12:00 pm – Conference Adjourns