What is the difference between an office visit and an outpatient visit?
♥♣♥ asked:
My doctor’s office is in a hospital and because my scheduled visit with this doctor was billed as an outpatient visit rather than as an office visit, my insurance would not pay for it. I’m confused as to what the difference is between an office visit and an outpatient visit. The appointment was scheduled far in advance and was in no way an emergency room visit.
Thank you in advance for your answers.
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My doctor’s office is in a hospital and because my scheduled visit with this doctor was billed as an outpatient visit rather than as an office visit, my insurance would not pay for it. I’m confused as to what the difference is between an office visit and an outpatient visit. The appointment was scheduled far in advance and was in no way an emergency room visit.
Thank you in advance for your answers.
November 23rd, 2009 at 12:41 pm
The BILL!!!!!! James D
November 25th, 2009 at 3:18 pm
An out patient visit is usually,performed in a hospitol and you normally get a procedure done that are not done in a office visit.All of the out patient visits that I have are done by the doctor or speacialist,not my family doctor.My guess is your doctor does some out patient procedures and his office staff billed it wrong talk to the billing dept at your doctors office. mr.mcscrofe
November 25th, 2009 at 11:32 pm
Insurance companies continue in business by
finding legal loopholes to get out of honoring
claims.In your case,there has been a goof-up
somewhere.I suggest you go back to the hospital and ask them to help you in the matter.
If you still encounter difficulty,request the physician for assistance.The last resort is ,of course,to seek legal remedy. ramchandra b
November 27th, 2009 at 8:48 am
Office = In the doctor’s office.
Outpatient = In the home. disgruntled600
November 28th, 2009 at 7:58 am
As far as i know the main difference is place and the procedure or something medical done there …
Office Visit :- this is generally doctor’s own or rented office belongs to her where she/he is available most of the days of a week and it has all the necessary equipment used for in general medical treatment … like for a gyn this would be a place where she has her own ultrasound ,lab and other equipment which she uses for the patients .
Outpatient Visit … :- this is said when a patient visits their doc in other places than her own office like if doc is said to be available for service in a hospital where speciality , surgeries and big medical procedures takes place which cannot be done in any normal offices …
At Places like these doc uses the equipment or medical supply supplied by the respective hospital .. so at situations like patient is billed for the service not Doc … when billing these kind of visits patient is said to have “outpatient visit”
U shud talk about this with ur doc and the insurance people to get more detailed explanation … In case of GYN if doc is available in any multispeciality hospital and doc saids to have some medical procedures done mostly either not by her or some other doc is hired for this purpose then u are billed outpatient ..
Inpatient visit : This is said when u are billed for some medical need u got from hospital where none is under ur regural docs service and u are admitted atleast for 6 hrs or had surgery performed on u there no matter how long u stay ..
These all sound like confusing … so its best to ask ur insurance guys by calling them at their 1 800 nums or customer service nums …
This is all i understood with my experience …
Hope this helped u
Best of luck and let me know further .. expertmom