Meet the Hospital's Longest-Serving Coworker
Posted on Friday, July 4th, 2014
Linda Dixon, Registered Medical Coder, Manager of Health
Information Services
Information Services
HEALTH INFORMATION SERVICES
The hospital was not yet two years old when Linda Dixon took a job as a switchboard operator and clerk on December 9, 1973.
Now in her 41st year, she is the hospital’s longest-serving coworker.
“Other than summer jobs during high school, I’ve never worked anywhere else. I had graduated from Turner High School in May.”
Dixon soon was promoted and trained in medical transcription, coding, and statistics in the department she now manages. She is a registered medical coder. These are the people who communicate with insurance companies.
They are experts in assigning a code for every procedure or service provided to a patient and classifying them.
The coding systems are used to report services to Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurance firms for the purpose of determining how much will be reimbursed to the hospital for a patient’s treatment.
“Coding is very important to the billing process to get a hospital claim paid.”
As the hospital converted from paper to computerized medical records, Dixon helped implement the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA). She was instrumental in writing policies that covered the privacy and security of a patient’s personal health information.
The privacy rules make sure a patient’s personal information is not given to outsiders without permission. The security rules make sure a patient’s personal information is stored safely.
In another duty area, Dixon administers the biannual credentialing of the primary care practitioners, radiologists, and consulting physicians who serve Mercy Health/Love County.
She also is medical staff coordinator, setting up and attending medical staff meetings and serving as secretary to the medical staff.