Missed payments, tougher payers and stretched staff top the Oct. 29 Practice Academy agenda

Missed supplemental payments, lopsided payer contracts and staff stretched past capacity each get an hour of attention Oct. 29, when the Practice Academy's Practice Management track returns with four afternoon sessions.

The virtual conference runs from noon to 4 p.m. EDT Thursday, Oct. 29, and registration is open. Backed by Physicians Practice, the track is built for physicians and practice administrators, with each session aimed at steps a practice can put to work right away.

Finding the money after the first payment

Eduardo Porras, assistant vice president of client services at Medusind, opens at noon with “Beyond the Base Payment: Capturing and Reconciling Supplemental Reimbursement.” Supplemental, enhanced and wraparound payments often arrive late or detached from the original encounter, which makes them easy to lose in reconciliation.

Porras will walk through where those payments tend to slip in Medicaid and other complex payment models, how to compare what a practice expected with what it actually received, and the metrics and controls that help flag underpayments. Medusind sponsors the session.

What the 2026 Confidence Index says about workload

At 1 p.m., Stacey Quinn, vice president of strategic partners and market development at PatientPoint, presents findings from the company's 2026 Physician Confidence Index and Practice Administrator Confidence Index, which surveyed 1,000 physicians and 300 practice administrators.

High patient volume ranked among physicians' top challenges, cited by 57 percent, while 54 percent of administrators put workforce management, staffing, retention and scheduling at the top of their list, according to the session description. The hour, sponsored by PatientPoint, focuses on low-lift ways to ease that load at the point of care.

Getting more out of payer negotiations

Doral Jacobsen, CEO of Prosper Beyond VBC, leads the 2 p.m. payer contracting session, built for practices that have price transparency data but still struggle to move payers. Jacobsen will draw on case studies from small pediatric and family medicine practices, clinics leaving clinically integrated networks to contract directly, specialty groups with ambulatory surgery centers, federally qualified health centers and behavioral health practices.

Attendees will practice negotiation skills in small groups and leave with ready-to-use language, the questions to ask payers during negotiations and a framework for building a contracting strategy.

Getting paid in Kentucky Medicaid

Keli Beeson, vice president of client success at Coronis Health, closes at 3 p.m. with a session for behavioral health providers billing Kentucky Medicaid. A code on the fee schedule does not guarantee payment, and Beeson will cover recent managed care organization changes, including claim form and type of bill requirements now driving denials.

She will also lay out a framework for confirming coverage, enrollment, authorization and documentation before a claim goes out, along with next steps on provider relations, commercial payer opportunities and revenue cycle partners. Coronis Health sponsors the session.

Each session runs one hour. Registration for the Oct. 29 track is open on the Practice Academy site.

Register for the Practice Academy Practice Management track.