Medical knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) involves outsourcing skilled medical tasks to third-party consultants, usually located offshore. This includes coding, transcription services, and some types of testing. The largest markets for these services are the healthcare industries in the US and UK. KPO seeks to address the need for accredited technicians by outsourcing these duties to developing countries with favorable exchange rates and educated English-speaking workforces. However, outsourcing diagnostic projects raises privacy and trustworthiness concerns.
Medical knowledge process outsourcing (KPO) is the transfer of responsibility for skilled medical tasks to third-party consultants, usually located offshore. Activities that have been successfully outsourced internationally include coding, transcription services and some types of testing. The largest markets for these services are the healthcare industries in the US and UK. KPO medical care services companies employed by medical societies and healthcare institutions are usually located in countries that have skilled English-speaking workforces, such as India and the Philippines.
Healthcare industries in countries with high living standards have experienced growing demand for services in the first decade of the 21st century due to aging growth impulse generation. While the supply of physicians has been steady, the number of qualified technicians available to handle the wide range of tasks associated with medical testing, billing and record keeping has not kept pace with demand. Medical KPO seeks to address the need for accredited technicians by outsourcing these duties to developing countries with favorable exchange rates, educated English-speaking workforces, and salary scales far below the industry standard in the source country.
Outsourcing unskilled jobs to foreign countries in the manufacturing sector, known as business process outsourcing (BPO), is an established part of the corporate operational toolbox. KPO applies BPO strategies to outsource jobs that require specific knowledge and credentials. Advances in communications technology and Internet connectivity have made it possible for a hospital, for example, to rely on remotely located expert technicians in its administrative and diagnostic process chains. A technician is no longer required to be located where the data collection takes place. Data files can be accessed from anywhere in the world and the work conducted updates to the hospital system in real time.
Medical KPO can include administrative or diagnostic projects. The healthcare industry has had the most success outsourcing administrative tasks, such as medical coding. Coding requires a trained expert to determine the appropriate billing codes that can be applied to a patient’s physician diagnosis. This is a relatively discreet billing activity that does not directly affect patient care.
Diagnostic projects, on the other hand, have a direct impact on patient treatment. Examples include the outsourcing of x-ray interpretation, test processing in areas such as oncology and genetic profiling, and the provision of innovative services such as telemedicine, where some diagnostic services are conducted over the telephone or over the Internet . Outsourcing these types of offshore projects has been less successful overall. While medical KPO may in theory be cheap and efficient, the practice of exposing patient information to workers in foreign countries raises privacy and trustworthiness concerns and increases legal exposure through the perception that medical processes that are outsourced offshore they are cheaper and of lower quality than comparable services provided by workers trained in the country of origin.
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