athenahealth and Lone Star MSO Partner to Help Texas Physicians Improve Collections

athenahealth, Inc., the premier provider of web-based services, knowledge, and software for medical practices, and Lone Star MSO, a physician-owned practice management company based in Dallas, Texas, have entered into a strategic alliance to offer physicians in Texas and throughout the Southwest athenahealth?s billing and practice management services to help manage their practices and improve collections.

Under the terms of the agreement, Lone Star MSO will be a value-added reseller of athenahealth?s award-winning revenue-cycle management service, athenaNet®, which will be offered to Lone Star MSO customers at preferred pricing. In addition, Lone Star will offer these medical groups other outsourced practice management services ? including managed care contracting, information technology, human resource management, ancillary services development, financial services and reporting, and analyses of staffing, workflow, and scheduling ? effectively removing the hassle of practice management.

?athenahealth had already dramatically improved our billing and collections at Texas Medical and Surgical, and we wanted to offer the same advantages to other medical groups,? said Trey Schroeder, vice president of Lone Star MSO and chief operating officer of Texas Medical and Surgical Associates, one of the state?s oldest medical groups and long-term customer of athenahealth. ?Like Lone Star, athenahealth is paid for its service-oriented solutions based on collections, so we have a common philosophy of sharing risks and rewards with our customers. Through our combined services, we are taking all the administrative headaches out of the equation so physicians can just focus on caring for their patients.?

For the past ten years, Texas Medical & Surgical has invested the human and financial capital necessary for Lone Star?s infrastructure. Due to its incredible success and performance using athenahealth, Texas Medical and Surgical decided to launch Lone Star MSO in 2006 to offer a comprehensive set of support services. Lone Star MSO fee schedules are customized for every practice, depending on services required and practice resources. With the addition of athenahealth?s web-based revenue cycle management service, medical groups using Lone Star can incorporate billing and accounts receivable management into their overall support services, helping to dramatically improve the overall performance of their practices. ?Lone Star will enhance the value and economic performance of client practices,? said Presley M. Mock, MD, president of Lone Star MSO. ?Through sophisticated operations management and optimal resource utilization, physicians and practice leadership will be enabled to focus their time, talent, and energy on clinical performance and outcomes as well as practice growth strategies.?

?Lone Star and athenahealth are both results-oriented companies who are tackling an expanding but complex market together,? said Derek Hedges, director of channel relations at athenahealth. ?By combining our billing and collections expertise with Lone Star?s other practice management capabilities, medical groups in Texas will now experience tremendous improvement to all aspects of their business and get back to focusing on patient care.?