Will or can an MRI indicate ability? Could we have to submit to an MRI to determine whether we would perform well at a job or even as entrance criteria to a university program? Here is the abstract on a recent study trying to  discover the answers.


"People differ in their ability to perform novel perceptual tasks, both during initial exposure and in the rate of improvement with practice. It is also known that regions of the brain recruited by particular tasks change their activity during learning. Here we investigate neural signals predictive of individual variability in performance. We used resting-state functional MRI to assess functional connectivity before training on a novel visual discrimination task. Subsequent task performance was related to functional connectivity measures within portions of visual cortex and between visual cortex and prefrontal association areas. Our results indicate that individual differences in performing novel perceptual tasks can be related to individual differences in spontaneous cortical activity."

I am doing a little catching up on "independence" guidance per AICPA guidelines (American institute of CPAs). The basic theory is that providing attestation services (reviewing financial information to verify to its accuracy)- that these services should be independent of the client. That there are inherent conflicts that can arise when a CPA is not independent. For example, if I owned a company that I was selling to you- if I told you I was a CPA, so you should trust me that the financials are accurate, would or should you trust my opinion?
No. You should not trust my opinion, because there is not independence in appearance or in mind. 

We may not be held to the AICPA standards of independence, but we hold to the values. Bern Medical provides a review of the procedures performed to discover certain procedures that were never billed. We are independent of the billing company and of the provider. We just care about discovering opportunities and/or verifying that all items were captured. 

Can a similar review be done by the billing company or the billing department? Of course, if they developed or acquired the technology or spent significant time. Auditing selections could also be made to help make discoveries. But when you are around 98-99% capture- you likely won't discover anything through selections- let alone all items that were missed.

But the real problem with having the review done by people that perform the billing function is independence. Stated from AICPA section 100-1 on Independence: Independence is defined as:

1. Independence of mind—The state of mind that permits the performance of an attest service without being affected by influences that compromise professional judgment, thereby allowing an individual to act with integrity and exercise objectivity and professional skepticism.
2. Independence in appearance—The avoidance of circumstances that would cause a reasonable and informed third party, having knowledge of all relevant information, including safeguards fn 2 applied, to reasonably conclude that the integrity, objectivity, or professional skepticism of a firm or a member of the attest engagement team had been compromised.

Great TED video about working and finding something you are passionate about. Worth the watch.

I will probably be writing about this on DiagnosticImaging.com so I will just link to it here. Interesting new tool for Correct Coding Initiative and Medical Unlikely Edits.
http://medcomplianceservices.com/cpt

I have written before about corporate culture and its impact to morale, productivity, and customer satisfaction. Nothing in life is a silver bullet, of course. But, culture matters. And what is demonstrated from leadership will resonate with everyone else in the group. Greg Smith of Goldman Sachs- of course you have not heard about him before now- but he was Executive Director of their derivative business in Europe, Middle East and Africa. He has been there for 12 years. Please read his resignation letter, published in the HY Times, indicting the change in the corporate culture at Goldman to be too focused on making money for the company, at the expense of best interest of the clients. Read: Here

Wanted to share a quick customer experience with you:

Recently Bern Medical analyzed the billing data for a company with 12 different MRI locations in the Midwest. The client uses a very popular and well respected billing company. Bern performed its analysis for the past 12 months, from January 2011 to December 2011. Bern discovered a very effective process but that the billing company had missed charges on particular days and then continued capturing all charges again. For example, for 3 days March 3, April 13 and October 6, 2011 nearly 150 MRI exams were never billed spanning across all locations. For all 12 months Bern discovered and verified 1% of annual volume was never billed. The client then processed through normal billing channels the missed charges. 

Bern's analysis allowed the MRI center to collect on $140k ($300k gross) of missed revenue opportunities.