Patient Support Specialist

Optum in the tri-state region (formerly CareMount Medical, ProHEALTH New York and Riverside Medical Group) offers an interconnected network that enables us to work collaboratively to better coordinate care among our doctors and care teams. Together, we offer you and your family access to more than 2,100 providers, representing 70 specialties, working in 360 medical practices and more than 55 urgent care locations across New York, New Jersey, and Southern Connecticut. For more information, visit www.optum.com/tri.

ProHealth is one of the largest private multi-specialty medical practices in the Northeast and has been serving the health needs of Long Island and the Greater New York Metropolitan area since 1997. With over 900 providers in 300 locations, our goal is to provide quality health care to ensure that our patients get the right care at the right time.

At Optum, we are transforming healthcare nationally while providing physician-led care locally. Work with the largest care delivery organization in the world and start doing your life's best work.(sm)

One of five regions in the Optum nationwide network, Optum Tri-State comprises three large multispecialty groups, CareMount Medical, ProHEALTH NY, and Riverside Medical Group. Optum Tri-State brings patients local care, backed by national expertise. As a premier provider of health care services, Optum Tri-State offers services including primary care, urgent care, a diverse range of specialty care, outpatient surgery, and imaging. The regions draws on the knowledge of leading doctors and healthcare experts to help 1.6 million patients across 630 locations access high quality, affordable healthcare within their community.

Together, for better health, Optum is committed to providing the highest standard of comprehensive medical care in a patient-centered and compassionate environment, with the comfort and convenience of being close to home.

If helping people live their healthiest lives is attractive to you, Optum is the place to be!

• We value work-life balance and have flexible on-site and remote non-clinical opportunities available
• We believe in employee development, professional growth and company longevity
• Our culture is one of mutual respect, teamwork and equality
• Competitive salary, great benefits, and other attractive incentives

Position Overview:
The Patient Support Specialist provides superior service and support to all patients calling Optum TriState’s Contact Center.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Receives and appropriately handles 85+ calls to schedule appointments for physicals, office and sick visits, consults, hospital follow ups, annual wellness exams and CDL exams across Internal Medicine and Clinical Specialties
• Maintains proficient knowledge of physician scheduling guidelines and preferences, utilizes all resources available; including iCare and www.Caremount.com and is well versed in all services provided by Optum to provide callers with accurate and appropriate information
• Maintains general insurance knowledge, utilizes appropriate resources to evaluate insurance participation and escalate issues to Patient Assistance as necessary
• Registers new patients, verifies accuracy of information and updates patient contact and account information per policy and procedures
• Utilizes AIDET to enhance patient experience and provide exceptional care by achieving one-call resolution through expert scheduling capabilities, in a courteous and professional manner
• Collects pertinent details and communicates effectively to create concise tasks to clinical team members
• Handles urgent/emergent calls according to specified procedures
• Researches, troubleshoots and resolves scheduling issues and patient complaints, taking all necessary steps to resolve and ensure full resolution. Reports scheduling/patient/operational issues to Leadership team and proactively makes recommendations/suggest solutions
• Takes initiative to collaborate with Leadership team and participates in cross functional focus groups for opportunities to cross-train and advance in skill/career development
• Completes daily administrative tasks, including; BMB’s, voicemail retrieval, Patient Portal, Patient Contact Preference and Scheduling Support mailboxes and possess solid knowledge of Saturday operational workflow
• Participates in weekly huddles and team meetings for updates and refreshers on call center processes, procedures and systems

Performance Requirements:

• Knowledge of telecommunication system and call management application(s) (Cisco Finesse)
• Ability to communicate verbally, and through written communications with patients, physicians, and other clinical/non-clinical staff in an effective and efficient manner
• Ability to navigate a computer while on the phone
• Maintain appropriate physical workspace requirements
• Meet expectations for information security, HIPAA and PCI compliance and ensure the protection of proprietary company and patient information accessible from remote office
• Ability to speak clearly and concisely with a professional and pleasant telephone voice
• Ability to problem solve for best resolution/patient experience
• Ability to adapt to frequent changes in scheduling protocols
• Ability to answer 85+ inbound calls per day
• Ability to de-escalate problem situations in a professional manner and utilize appropriate service recovery techniques
• Ability to handle stressful situations and act accordingly
• Ability to work in a team environment and establish and maintain effective working relationships with physicians, co-workers and other departments and teams
• Maintain proficiency within NextGen EPM/EHR and other applications required for patient care
• Adhere to all applicable company policies and procedures
• Complete all mandatory compliance and safety training

Typical Physical Demands:

• Work requires sitting for long periods of time.
• Requires the extensive use of office equipment including computer, telephone, and telephone headset

Typical Working Conditions:

• Involves frequent phone contact with patients.
• Work may be stressful at times, and interaction with others is ongoing throughout the day

You’ll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.

Required Qualifications:

• Proven record of meeting key performance metrics in a work from home environment
• Proven superior customer service skills
• PC proficiency with Microsoft Office and Outlook
• Proven self-starter with the ability to work independently
• Full COVID-19 vaccination is an essential job function of this role. Candidates located in states that mandate COVID-19 booster doses must also comply with those state requirements. UnitedHealth Group will adhere to all federal, state and local regulations as well as all client requirements and will obtain necessary proof of vaccination, and boosters when applicable, prior to employment to ensure compliance. Candidates must be able to perform all essential job functions with or without reasonable accommodation

Preferred Qualifications:

• High School diploma or equivalent/GED. 1+ years of contact center experience in a large call center environment
• Large multi-specialty group medical practice experience

To protect the health and safety of our workforce, patients and communities we serve, UnitedHealth Group and its affiliate companies require all employees to disclose COVID-19 vaccination status prior to beginning employment. In addition, some roles and locations require full COVID-19 vaccination, including boosters, as an essential job function. UnitedHealth Group adheres to all federal, state and local COVID-19 vaccination regulations as well as all client COVID-19 vaccination requirements and will obtain the necessary information from candidates prior to employment to ensure compliance. Candidates must be able to perform all essential job functions with or without reasonable accommodation. Failure to meet the vaccination requirement may result in rescission of an employment offer or termination of employment

CareMount Medical, ProHEALTH Care Associates, and Riverside Medical Group (the “Practices”) are all physician owned and led practices having complete authority for all medical decision-making and patient care through their physicians and other licensed professionals. Optum, through its management organizations (“Optum”) provides non-clinical administrative services to support the Practices and their physicians. Neither Optum nor its management companies employ, engages, or supervises physicians or other licensed professionals, or determines or sets the methods, standards, or conduct of the practice of medicine or health care provided by the Practices or by any of their licensed professionals. “Part of Optum” reflects that the Practices are part of Optum’s effort to support forward-thinking physician practices in helping their patients live healthier lives.

Careers with Optum. Our objective is to make health care simpler and more effective for everyone. With our hands at work across all aspects of health, you can play a role in creating a healthier world, one insight, one connection and one person at a time. We bring together some of the greatest minds and ideas to take health care to its fullest potential, promoting health equity and accessibility. Work with diverse, engaged and high-performing teams to help solve important challenges.

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone–of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income–deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes — an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.

Diversity creates a healthier atmosphere: UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by law.

UnitedHealth Group is a drug - free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.