What YOs should know. Your first physician job and onboarding.

INTRO

You’ve made it. You’re through the years of training and have signed your first contract. You have a start date. You’re just sprinting to the end of fellowship/residency/etc. And now you’re getting emails from some random administrative email asking you to sign another thousand forms and complete pages and pages of documentation. Whether you’re a young ophthalmologist or any other specialty, let me de-mystify the practice onboarding process.

Credentialing, either at a hospital, surgery center, or for a clinical practice, requires a vast amount of background history on your experience and education. Most of the time, someone at your fellowship or center will have helped set up these logins when you started seeing patients independently. Don’t worry. We know you don’t remember the logins or your passwords. Figuring these out is its own right of passage.

Below is a list of key things you’ll need to provide to your first job so they can get you on boarded for hospitals, insurances, and surgery centers.

THE PROCESS

The process for getting you par goes as follows:

1. Get your State Medical License in the state you plan to practice in

2. One you have your SML, enroll/update your Medicare Enrollment on PECOS

3. Ensure your Malpractice Insurance Coverage is in place & DEA license is moved to the practice state

4. Complete every single crazy piece of paperwork the administrator asks you to as they relate to insurance and hospitals. This means signing A LOT of forms

5. Repeat. And repeat. And repeat

The issue isn’t the applications themselves, through they are not fun. The issue is that each of these steps can take several weeks to months to complete. Onboarding a new physician with no history if practicing in the state can take anywhere from 4-8 months. The average timeframe we work with in 6 months. You’re responsiveness means easing your transition into the practice and will greatly impress your new leadership.

KNOW YOUR NUMBERS

Half the battle is figuring out what your provider numbers are below. If you have them from the jump, you will bring an administrator to (happy) tears.

1. Medical License Number

2. NPI Number

3. DEA Number

4. Medicare ID (also known as PTAN)

5. Medicaid ID (13 characters)

6. CAQH Number

7. Taxonomy Code

NPPES & PECOS LOGINS

The National Plan & Provider Enumeration System (NPPES) is the one your NPI (National Provider Identification) is issued through. The Provider Enrollment, Chain, and Ownership System (PECOS) system is how you apply, move enrollments, and confirm practice payments for Medicare. While practices have their own way to login and verify your information, you will need to know your usernames and passwords to confirm any changes to your provider record.

Resetting your login

Resetting your password with both these programs is rather easy, however, you are unable to delegate this task. You must call and request the reset through the customer service line.

CAQH

The Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare (CAQH) is a central hub that nearly all insurance companies use to verify your information. While you might not have needed it at a large academic program, you will definitely need to know your login and password when you are joining a practice.

Not sure if you have a login already or not? Hit the ‘Check for CAQH ID’ on the login page and follow the prompts. If you do have a login and need to reset the password, follow the prompts.

Once in, it will ask you to confirm your educational history and current work locations. This can be done with your Administrator at a later time. Do not stress about making changes until you are asked to do so.

CAQH is billed as an all-in-one alternative to eliminate duplicative paperwork. Boy do I wish that statement was 100% true. While well-meaning, I find that practices still complete hundreds of pages of duplicative paperwork per year. And yes, you too will experience this at your first “real” job. See below.

THE BASIC INFORMATION

This Standard Credentialing Form was created after years of onboarding new Physicians. It includes just about every piece of information we will need to get you up and running. All dates need to be in MM/YYYY format. All addresses need to be as complete as possible. Future you will thank Current you for your detail-orientation. You’d be surprised just how many times you will need this information in the future and how much harder it becomes to recall the older you get.

That CAQH above? Yep, they are going to ask you all the info that’s on this form. Still, do the work and fill it out.

SUPPORTING DOCUMENTS

If you do nothing else from this post. Do the below. You’ll thank me later. Well, you might forget I told you, but future you will be super impressed!

1. Create a folder on your computer

2. Put copies of these documents in your new folder.

   1. Current Medical license(s) and DEA license(s)

   2. Malpractice face sheets (yes, you should have these from residency on. Normally you are covered by the institution and they can provide you a copy)

   3. Undergrad and Graduate Diplomas

   4. Board Certification

   5. Federal Background Checks/Finger printing

   6. Last TB test (has to be no less than 5 years old) and HepB vaccination proof

   7. A copy of the completed Standard Credentialing Form

SURGERY CENTER/ HOSPITAL SUPPLEMENTS

While rare, credentialing you with a new ASC or Hospital can require additional information. The most important thing to keep are detailed case logs of the procedures you plan to apply for. This will be critical if you are asking for a unique privilege the facility is not used to providing or happens to be pediatric in nature.

YOUR LOGINS. YOUR RECORDS. YOUR RESPONSIBILITY

While the administrative team prides themselves on helping make your paperwork life easier, ultimately your renewals, your logins, and keeping things up to date are your responsibility. Put a calendar reminder annually on your phone to keep up to date with any renewals so that nothing is missed.