Automation, Integration, and Proactive Outreach to Meet New Medicaid Rules: Laxmi Patel

As Medicaid documentation requirements are expected to tighten under the Budget Reconciliation Act, providers face the challenge of staying compliant without creating new barriers to health care.

Laxmi Patel, chief strategy officer at Savista, emphasizes that automation, digital integration, and proactive outreach are essential to streamline eligibility checks and prevent delays. She recommends embedding document capture into scheduling systems, enabling uploads via patient portals, and providing kiosks or navigators for those lacking digital access. Patel also stresses the need for early engagement with high-risk patients and staff training that balances compliance with compassion to preserve care continuity and patient dignity.

Check out the previous interview segment, where Patel gives providers tips to prepare for rising uninsured volumes and gives real-world examples of strategies that cut bad debt.

This transcript has been lightly edited; captions were auto-generated.

Transcript

What steps can providers take to meet new Medicaid documentation requirements without creating additional barriers to patient access or care continuity?

In an ideal situation, we would make these documentation requirements invisible to the patient where it's possible. The rules through the budget reconciliation could make it really easy to create bottlenecks and create really inefficient processes, like thinking about a patient waiting in the ED [emergency department] while staff is trying to chase down proof of employment or residency to understand if they're going to have coverage there.

Providers really need to focus on a couple of things, in my opinion: automation, integration, and proactive outreach.

First, on that automation concept, automate that eligibility and documentation capture at every interaction point you have. Especially non-ED visits, as soon as you have the scheduling, you know you're starting the registration or clearance process, ask for the information, have them upload it. Use vendors, use data sources from a trusted third party to pull income, pull residency, that employment data, so that patients aren't asked to bring documentation that they don't know how to get or don't know if they have access to. This can also reduce no-show or care delays.

Second is to integrate the Medicaid documentation into that digital front door. If a patient can upload the pay stub or residency proof via MyChart or another secure portal before arrival, give them that optionality, reduce that in-person bottleneck and shuffling of paper. Help patients really understand what that digital access means. When they don't have it, offer on-site kiosks or navigator assistants that are on site to help do that intake that can help bridge the gaps.

Third is to be proactive with biannual redetermination. They're biannual; we're going to know once you get approved when the next one is going to be, so don't wait until a patient loses coverage. Identify those high-risk patients months ahead. The ones that you knew took a long time to get the paperwork, have that conversation now. Before that renewal, push reminder calls, texts, engage community partners. In rural, immigrant-heavy communities where documentations are harder to produce, work with trusted organizations who are there to help patients prepare.

Finally, it's the training, whether it's on the process or empathy with financial counselors. It's not just whether you're in compliance, but how to be compliant. And they should be able to meet the requirements while still protecting patient dignity, avoiding unnecessary care delays, or escalating those urgent cases of same-day clinical access.