The DME industry has been in a state of change, whether it involves inflation, the challenged supply chain, or payor contract adjustments. At Medbill, we’re here to help you. Our vision is to be a trusted and essential partner who inspires and leads in process, expertise, and technology.

Here are some of our thoughts regarding the latest DME concerns with supply chain and inflation.

Diminishing Supply Chain for DME

Unfortunately, port gridlock and oversees manufacturers’ temporary closures (which are responsible for providing some medical equipment) don’t appear to be resolving themselves anytime soon. As a result, learning how to navigate this supply chain crisis continues to be challenging for many DME owners.

Although we wish there were a simple answer, at this time, there’s not, but here are some suggestions of how you can handle the supply chain issues with your business.

Thoroughly review all DME orders to ensure medical necessity before supplying equipment to ensure the DME is going to the correct patients.
Diversify your suppliers when possible. Monitor all manufacturers who supply DME and place orders with several suppliers. If there’s a significant price difference, you’ll have to evaluate whether to lower your profit margin or potentially lose the business.
Build up your inventory. Review your most popular equipment and consider stocking up those items when the opportunity arises.
Maintain inventory counts, so you’re always aware of what you always have in stock.

DME Businesses and Inflation

It’s important to understand that inflation impacts all business areas from raw materials, inventory, shipping costs, and operational expenses. That’s why you need to learn how to navigate these inflation prices so you can still meet customer orders while maintaining a profit. Thankfully, the U.S. Senate and President Biden paused the 4% PAYGO cuts to Medicare reimbursements from going into effect until April 2022.

Also, legislation was introduced in the US House of Representative HR6641 the DME POS Relief Act of 2022. This will apply a 90/10 Medicare reimbursement rate for the bid areas and 13 product categories that were not implemented in 2021. There’s a possibility for increased reimbursement for those areas and product categories.

In the meantime, instead of an overall price increase, consider the following. Review your inventory and the specific products lines that are impacted the most from inflation and determine if this is a valuable revenue stream for your business.

Another strategy to manage the rising inflation is to improve overall productivity. Start by reviewing all business departments to see where improvements can be made. When you review the billing department, here are some areas you can examine more thoroughly.

Learn How Medbill Can Help with Your Business

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