Beyond the Bottom Line cover art

Beyond the Bottom Line

Beyond the Bottom Line

Written by: Panacea Healthcare Solutions
Listen for free

About this listen

 Welcome to Panacea’s podcast Beyond the Bottom Line: Let’s talk healthcare, finance, revenue cycle and compliance. Hosted by, Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions. Whether you’re a healthcare executive, a financial professional, or simply curious about how these essential pieces of the healthcare puzzle fit together, you’re in the right place. Our goal is simple to give you actionable insights and expert perspectives that can help you optimize your operations and drive strategic growth.2025 Panacea Healthcare Solutions, LLC Politics & Government
Episodes
  • Medicaid Eligibility Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act: Our Expert Breaks it Down

    Medicaid Eligibility Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act: Our Expert Breaks it Down
    Jul 22 2025
    Medicaid Eligibility Under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act: Our Expert Breaks it Down With Host Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions and Guest Brian Herdman, Director, Financial Reimbursement Services, KA Consulting Division In this episode of Beyond the Bottom Line, Kevin Chmura is joined by policy expert Brian Herdman to discuss how the One Big Beautiful Bill Act is set to impact Medicaid eligibility, what this critical issue means for hospitals and healthcare providers, and how these changes can affect your bottom line. Kevin and Brian dive into not only what changes providers can expect to see right away, but also those changes which will be coming into play in the next few years, and how to best prepare before they happen. They also explore what challenges hospitals can expect to see as a result of this bill’s passage, as well as if there are any positives for healthcare systems or providers. Episode transcript available below. Kevin Chmura Hi, and welcome back to Beyond the Bottom Line, Panacea’s Podcast exploring the business and policy issues that matter most to healthcare organizations. I’m your host, Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions. In this follow-up episode, we’ll continue our conversation with Panacea’s policy expert, Brian Herdman, about Medicaid funding, a critical issue for hospitals and healthcare providers, and take a closer look at how the latest developments in Congress and the administration could impact your bottom line. We’ll also revisit some of the practical steps you should be thinking about today to strengthen your organization’s financial position now that we’ve seen how these policy issues have unfolded. So Brian, welcome back to the podcast. Brian Herdman Great to be here. Kevin Chmura Great to have you back. So, Brian, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the OBBBA has now been signed into law and we did a podcast on this topic in March, at which point we were really looking at the versions of the bill that were being kicked around. We were really probably going more off of what we were seeing in the press, in the media, and less what we really knew. Now we’re getting a real look at it. You’ve had an opportunity to spend some time with the text and do your analysis. You are by far our best regulatory expert here at Panacea, so interested in in what you’re saying now, we can spend a lot of time going through the individual provisions as they relate to Medicaid and those things that will be deeply impactful. If we went through all of them, this would be a three hour podcast and I think we lose a lot of the audience. I thought maybe what would be better for everybody, given your expertise in this area? Probably crafting it a little to our target audience, which is probably mostly hospitals and health systems, wondering if you might just spend some time talking about those provisions and those elements that you’re paying the most attention to, the things that you think will be most impactful. And maybe we just take the conversation from there. Brian Herdman Sure. Sure, Kevin. So, you know, after all that back and forth and all those, you know, 4th of July deadline to get the bill passed and whatnot, there is a lot of, you know, what’s going to stay in, what’s not going to stay in between the House and Senate reconciliation process. And now that that has shook out, you know, as I’m looking at the Medicaid specific provisions, because I think that’s where the big change is going to be for our clients, on that Medicaid provisions, you know, there’s kind of two kind of two way, two sets of issues our clients are going to have to look at, you know, the things are going to affect which specific claims are going to be eligible for Medicaid and at what amount. And just generally speaking, the environment that the state, that the provider operates in the state with the state’s Medicaid program, what’s happening with FMAP, what’s happening with state directed payments and how is that going to all unfold? So as I’m looking at those two kind of main themes, you know, what’s happening like, you know, soon what’s happening soon-ish and then, you know, what’s kind of pushed out far ahead. And when I look at the things that are coming up soon, it’s not anything that’s like, you know, hair on fire, oh, my gosh, we have to do a lot of things differently. There was that immediate elimination of some moratorium on some things that would get you streamline applications into Medicaid. That’s going away. And, you know, there is that reduction in FMAP percentage to states when they have done that expansion. But, you know, on the margins, none of those things are going to be a dramatic change to how our clients, you know, get how many of those claims go through and how much they really get paid by the state. When you really start to see that happen is around January 2027. That’s when we’ll start to see a lot of ...
    Show More Show Less
    15 mins
  • Unlocking Access: How RevenueRx Transforms Drug Assistance for Hospitals

    Unlocking Access: How RevenueRx Transforms Drug Assistance for Hospitals
    Jul 14 2025
    Unlocking Access: How RevenueRx Transforms Drug Assistance for Hospitals With Host Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions and Guest BreAnn Meadows, President, Revenue Integrity Services In this episode of Beyond the Bottom Line, Kevin Chmura is joined by BreAnn Meadows to discuss Panacea’s latest healthcare solution: RevenueRx: Drug Assistance Program designed to help hospitals streamline access to free drugs, co-pay assistance, and charitable foundation support programs. Kevin and Bre delve into this new service, what it offers to hospitals, why the solution is being introduced now, and what sets RevenueRx apart from other programs. They also share specific examples of how it can deliver measurable benefits and meaningful impact for your healthcare organization. Episode transcript available below. Kevin Chmura Welcome to Beyond the Bottom Line: Let’s talk healthcare, finance, revenue cycle and compliance. I’m your host, Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions. Whether you’re a healthcare executive, a finance professional, or simply curious about how these essential pieces of the healthcare puzzle fit together, you’re in the right place. The goal is simple: Give you actionable insights and expert perspectives that can help you optimize your operations and drive strategic growth. In today’s episode, we’re talking about a topic that’s becoming a real game changer for hospitals and health systems, patient drug assistance. Joining me is BreAnn Meadows, president of Revenue Integrity Services here at Panacea Healthcare Solutions. Bre and her team just launched RevenueRx, a service that’s helping hospitals streamline access to free drugs, co-pay assistance and charitable foundation support programs. Welcome, Bre. Bre Meadows Thank you. Kevin Chmura So let’s start with the basics. What is RevenueRx? And it’s probably a good place to start. And why did we decide to launch this at Panacea now? Bre Meadows So RevenueRx is a comprehensive tech enabled service that helps hospitals and cancer centers manage the manufacturer-sponsored drug programs. And then also the foundation assistance. So, as you said, we do include services based around the manufacturer free drug programs, the co-pay assistance programs, and the charitable foundation funding we launched RevenueRx because hospitals are still continuing to face growing pressures. The cost of drugs just continues to go up, and the payer policies get more and more difficult to manage, along with patients out-of-pocket and coverage determinations always being really challenging. So there’s a lot of roadblocks when a patient gets a diagnosis where they have to go to a cancer or infusion center to start one of these treatments. And the reason we launched this program is to really help hospitals clear those roadblocks so patients can get access to care without being financially destroyed by their diagnosis. So it’s a great program that really benefits the facility financially as well as the patient, to give them access to these drugs that could save their life. Kevin Chmura Wow. So real win/win, right? You’ve got better access for the patients and operational relief and revenue, most importantly, for hospitals and health systems, which is great. It’s always nice when everybody gets a win out of it. So great rundown on the on the benefits of it. But can you walk us through what is the actual deliverable of RevenueRx? Bre Meadows Sure. So RevenueRx is almost set up a little bit differently than some other services that are out there that even though we’re technical, we still really focus on the service and really working closely with the organization and their patients. So what we manage is everything, soup-to-nuts, starting with the application process. So we do all the screening of patients looking for all the programs that the patient could qualify for, completing the application and making sure the patients get approved for not just the primary drug that they may be receiving for that service, but any and all drugs to minimize their out-of-pocket as much as possible. The second piece that we do is making sure that after the application is approved, that everything gets followed through on behalf of the patient and the organization. So when we talk about “free drug,” we handle the ordering and try to get everything ordered as prospectively as possible. And we could talk a little bit more in depth about the advantages of that and billing compliance, but making sure that also the patient has confidence as they’re coming in for these visits. They know that we’ve taken care of it. They know their drug is sitting there waiting for them and that they’re not going to be getting a bill after they leave the center. And then the third part is on the co-pay and foundation programs. Again, after a patient is approved, we do all the tracking to make sure that the funds get loaded for the patient and then make it...
    Show More Show Less
    14 mins
  • Beyond the Bottom Line – Episode 3

    Beyond the Bottom Line – Episode 3
    May 14 2025
    Price Transparency Enforcement Ramps Up: What Hospitals Need to Know With Host Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions and Guest Govi Goyal, President, Financial Services In this episode of Beyond the Bottom Line, host Kevin Chmura and guest Govi Goyal dive into the latest developments in hospital price transparency following President Trump’s February 25th executive order. The order directed federal agencies to rapidly ramp up enforcement of existing transparency regulations and explore new ways to ensure compliance—with a clear 90-day deadline. Kevin and Govi break down what this means for healthcare organizations, including the surge in CMS enforcement activity, the potential for updated guidance on standardization and data reporting, and how hospitals can prepare. Drawing on recent client experiences and industry trends, the conversation offers timely insights for revenue cycle, compliance, and pricing leaders navigating the shifting transparency landscape. Episode transcript available below. Kevin: Hi, and welcome to the episode Panacea’s podcast Beyond the Bottom Line. Let’s talk healthcare, finance, revenue cycle and compliance. I’m your host, Kevin Chmura, CEO of Panacea Healthcare Solutions. Today, we’re going to be doing a follow-up to a podcast we released in February highlighting kind of the rapid reaction to an executive order signed by President Trump, doubling down on price transparency enforcement. It’s been a little bit of time since then, and we thought it would be a good time to bring back our guest from that episode, Govi Goyal, who is President of our Financial Services division and leads our price transparency practices and really a national nationally recognized expert on all topics price transparency. To kind of give us an update on how that’s translating out into the market and what we’re seeing. So first, let me welcome Govi. Thanks for coming back. Govi: Thanks Kevin. Good morning. Kevin: So, maybe just set it up for the listeners, if you didn’t get a chance to listen to our first podcast, you can find that on our website. Also, you can find those on Apple Podcasts as well. If you want to go back and subscribe to Beyond the Bottom Line. But I’ll just I’ll do a quick rundown of why we did that podcast and then maybe stick to what we’re seeing. So in that we talked about ,that on February 25th, President Trump signed a new executive order. And what that did was it specifically instructed the Secretaries of Treasury, Labor and Health and Human Services to rapidly implement actions to enforce the price transparency regulations from the original executive order, EO 13877, and this was an important piece, within 90 days. So he put the word rapidly in there. But then he also defined what rapidly was, which is within 90 days. I want to see enforcement of the existing regulations and also instructed them to, if you can find new ways to enforce regulations. It’s been about 75 days since then, and we are starting to see some of that executive order filter out into the marketplace. And so, you know, just in our internal discussions, we’ve talked a little bit about what we’re seeing. So Govi, maybe I won’t oversell it. Maybe you could just tell us what are you hearing out in the market? What are we seeing? What are what our customers and prospects calling us, telling us, like, what? What’s out there right now? Govi: Yeah, slowly. And I think the executive order is a good place to start because that’s what’s really triggering a lot of the activity that we’re seeing. And you hit the nail on the head. It’s really a two-pronged approach. There’s the increased enforcement, which we’re definitely seeing and we’re going to jump into. But then there’s a second part, which is around actually improving the price transparency requirements. And so it’ll be interesting to see. We’ve got, as you mentioned, just about 16 days left here before the 90 days is up. As part of the executive order, there’s language in there that states within 90 days we should see either updated guidance or proposed regulatory action on two different things. One is around ensuring pricing information is more standardized and is easily comparable across hospital health plans, which does a little, I’m really interested is hear and see what that guidance might be, because back in 2024, July of 2024, it was required for all hospitals to comply with a standardized CMS template. And the primary reason for that is to get to more apples-to-apples comparisons so you wouldn’t accidentally compare like a case rate to a per diem or a PPO to HMO. So we’ll see what other, you know, further guidance or regulatory action is going to be coming up for hospitals or even health plans to comply with. The other piece is more around seeing any guidance or regulatory action in terms of reporting a complete, accurate and meaningful data. And that’s more around ...
    Show More Show Less
    19 mins
No reviews yet