After spending the first half of his career as an emergency physician, Dr. JJ Dubec transitioned to family medicine. Over the past 10 years he has built his family practice and currently operates clinics in Vancouver as well as telehealth clinics in Surrey and Port Alberni. His practice cares for a very diverse population of 2500-3500 patients of all ages and ethnic groups.
We sat down with Dr. Dubec to talk about his challenges and how DoctorCare has helped his practice.
“DoctorCare has really helped me ensure that I’m getting paid for all of the service that I am providing to my patients. There is always someone at the end of the phone to answer any of my questions. They’re not making me do any extra work and, in fact, they take on most of that and that to me is a win-win situation.“
DoctorCare: What are some of the big challenges you face at your practice?
Dr. Dubec: Aside from the obvious challenges dealing with COVID-19, the biggest thing is really just having enough time in the day to both manage my practice from the business side while helping and caring for as many patients as possible. I have two young boys as well, so I want to make sure I can spend as much time with them as possible. Managing billings in the most effective, efficient way possible is probably the biggest time suck.
DoctorCare: Let’s talk about billings. How have you been managing that part of your practice?
Dr. Dubec: It (billing) is such an important part of our medical practice in terms of earnings and how we pay ourselves for what we do, but there wasn’t really any courses or specific training for doctors to attend to learn how to do this. So, I just relied on colleagues and asked them what they did – but even your most keen colleagues might not be optimizing their billings properly. During my career, I felt like I had been on top of things really well but to really optimize your billings takes time; time to research, time to look up codes, and time to figure out what is eligible. I don’t want to be spending the little free time I have looking through MSP billing code binders and PDF files of billing codes and rules when I could be spending that time playing with my kids.
There is also a level of interest factor. Some doctors (like me) feel they are doing well and making enough, but don’t realize that missing a code could mean an extra $30,000 of earnings.
DoctorCare: Is this what made you start rethinking how you manage your billings?
Dr. Dubec: Yes, I had been thinking about how to make my billings more efficient. When I was working with a group of doctors a few years ago, one of the staff looked after several of the clinics. She came by and did a sit down with each of the doctors and said, “Here are the new codes, start using them.” I think if you’re just throwing a stack of papers in a doctor’s lap and saying, “Here’s your new codes, learn these and start implementing them,” it is still up to the doctor to tackle that learning curve and the various factors to actually implementing that; checking your own records, finding the patients, and categorizing the patients, etc.
DoctorCare: Why did you choose DoctorCare?
Dr. Dubec: When I was approached by DoctorCare, they offered a complimentary audit report to look at my billings and find anything that had been missed. They immediately identified areas that I could be billing for and getting that revenue on my next pay. That was a deciding factor for me. I realized that I just missed those billings completely and there were also funds that I had access to that I just didn’t realize. Having a comprehensive look at all my billings, ongoing maintenance of that, and the ongoing analysis of billings actually more than pays for itself in the additional revenue DoctorCare is finding for me.
DoctorCare: Lastly, tell us about your experience with DoctorCare.
Dr. Dubec: It was easy to get started and continues to be easy to work with the team every month. The reports are great and easy to understand, the follow-up is always appropriate and timely and the DoctorCare team is respectful of my time. DoctorCare has really helped me ensure that I’m getting paid for all of the service that I am providing to my patients. There is always someone at the end of the phone to answer any of my questions. They’re not making me do any extra work and, in fact, they take on most of that and that to me is a win-win situation.
