In May, Grady Memorial Hospital signed an agreement to return the billing requirements from their independent Radiology Partner, Eagle Rad, Inc., back to the doctors who perform the “professional component”, a fee for reading the images and reporting back to the hospital on what the Radiologist interprets. 

For many years, GMH billed patients for both the actual task of taking X-Rays, C.T scans, and/or Ultrasound images, in addition to invoicing for the professional component.  A major factor for splitting this billing back into two parts was due to Grady Memorial Hospital being made aware that patients had been receiving bills from both GMH and Radiology Partner, EagleRad, for the same radiology interpretation service performed.  This redundancy was confusing for patients and Grady is pleased to share a resolution to this problem, but it also means patients will get two components billed separately.  Grady Memorial Hospital has signed a contract with EagleRad that will require them to complete and file their own portion of the professional billing separate to that of GMH for the “technical” work. This will eliminate the problem of duplicate claims, inaccurate charges on patient accounts, as well as, reduce the workload for the Business Office at the hospital to resolve these errors on the part of EagleRad. 

“For many years, the professional component billing has been driven by a split billing concept depending on what type of radiology service was performed”, said Melissa Daniels, Revenue Cycle Director. “That meant that some services were supposed to be billed by only the hospital and some were split into hospital and EagleRad portions. This type of billing doesn’t work well and cause duplicate billing as well as poor patient satisfaction. Many facilities have chosen to eliminate split billing scenarios due to this.”

Patients will now receive a separate bill from Grady Memorial Hospital for the technical component of performing the services and a separate bill from EagleRad, Inc. for the professional reading of radiology imaging.  It is the hope of Grady Memorial Hospital that this will remove billing confusion, increase efficiency, and provide patients with the easiest method for radiology service billing and payment.