Established in 2013, and formerly known as Southwest Retina Consultants, Southwest Eye Consultants is dedicated to providing the highest quality, most advanced medical and surgical eye care in the Four Corners region that includes southwest Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Arizona. Based in Durango, CO, but with satellite offices in Cortez, CO and Farmington, NM, the providers and staff at Southwest Eye Consultants serve the diverse population of the Four Corners region by providing state-of-the-art medical and surgical eye care.
In charge of the practice’s financial operations is Jessica Catalano, Director of Finance at Southwest Eye Consultants. With the practice having been on IntelleChartPRO EHR and Practice+ PM and knowing that the providers were already fond of that system, Catalano recognized that they needed an integrated solution to streamline payments processing. She found just such a solution in Nextech Payments.
“There were far too many disconnects in our previous payments solution,” said Catalano. “This resulted in claims being sent out with missing information”. In addition to inaccuracies and claim rejection issues, their previous solution was killing efficiency at the practice. Lack of integration required data to be entered multiple times and led to unnecessarily wasted time and effort. “The big problem was the redundant data entry,” she continued. “We always had to enter the information twice - once for the third-party payment system and again into our billing system - taking twice as long as it should have.”
Jessica Catalano
Director of Finance
Jessica Catalano
Director of Finance
“The implementation and onboarding process was as simple as it could get,” said Catalano. “Set up took less than 5 minutes and we were ready to go." After a fast, easy implementation and setup, even those staff members who could not attend experienced no issues getting caught up. As Catalano explained, “We’ve had no problem getting everyone up to speed on using it since it is so intuitive.”
“We no longer have just one designated computer for taking payments at checkout like we used to,” she went on. “With Nextech Payments, we can take payments at any computer in the office or do it on the move with a wireless terminal.”
The improved mobility and freedom they’ve experienced with Nextech Payments’ wireless card terminals is not the only benefit of implementing the new solution. Southwest Eye Consultants has also seen a significant boost in efficiency as the integrated nature of their new payments solution has consolidated tasks and eliminated unnecessary repetitiveness.“
Nextech Payments increased efficiency since we don’t have to go through a third-party website to process payments anymore,” said Catalano. “We’re saving exactly 3 minutes and 47 seconds per patient when processing payments. This adds up to many hours saved per week and has helped create a far smoother patient journey.”
In addition to boosted efficiency, the providers and staff at Southwest Eye Consultants are also enjoying more accurate accounting and bookkeeping with far less effort. As Catalano explained, “We’ve also improved accuracy in our financials. Previously, we had a situation where payments were being taken but not recorded in the system because people would forget they needed to enter it again. This made it look like patients hadn’t paid balances when they had. Fixing this has had a significant positive impact on both staff morale and patient satisfaction.”
“I would absolutely recommend Nextech Payments to other practices,” said Catalano. “It will make your life so much easier, and your staff will be so happy that you did.”