How Hospitals Can Cut Uncompensated Care Expenses and Boost Revenue

Hospitals across the country are navigating an industry-wide financial crisis with no clear end in sight. According to the American Hospital Association, since 2000, they have delivered nearly $745 billion in uncompensated care, driven by a growing uninsured population, higher out-of-pocket costs for insured patients, and deep Medicaid cuts — approaching a trillion dollarsⁱ — alongside redetermination challenges.

The strain doesn’t stop there. Administrative costs are climbing due to burdensome commercial payer practices, shifting regulations, inflation, chronic staffing shortages, and persistent supply chain disruptions. Add in economic uncertainty, including tariffs, and hospitals are facing a perfect storm that threatens their ability to sustain operations and deliver high-quality patient care.

Investigation Reveals Pathways to Compensation

Uncompensated care is a deceptive, catch-all term that belies the range of underlying causes for non-payment, from indigence to claim denials. In the latter case, a significant portion of injury-related claims can and should be reimbursed through third-party liability coverage; the trick is to find it.  

Identifying third-party medical coverage (also known as subrogation) instead of or in addition to primary health insurance is time-consuming. It requires countless phone calls, manual research, and making sense of incomplete patient questionnaires. Patients may not provide or even know whether they have coverage.

Even the most diligent billing teams may find themselves grasping at straws and troubleshooting errors. Indeed, according to Intellivo, only 59% of motor vehicle accidents, the most common type of subrogation event, are billed to the appropriate payer. Failure to identify the proper payer leads to claim denials and misclassification of patients as self-pay. Over time, these errors erode operating margins, potentially triggering staff and service reductions or eliminations.

Hospitals must capture every possible dollar of revenue for services rendered if they hope to bridge funding gaps and push toward profitability.

Integrated Technology Can Help Capture More Revenue

Uncovering and claiming revenue left on the table is crucial — but very difficult to do without help from technology. A best-in-class, third-party liability discovery solution is an essential tool that can be integrated into existing workflows, helping billing teams rapidly find coverage including:

• Auto insurance
  • Worker’s compensation
  • Homeowner’s insurance
  • Long-term care insurance
  • Product or premises liability
  • Court-ordered health coverage

The most effective third-party liability discovery offerings can identify every coverage option and payer source, matching the correct payer to the patient. This is a game changer for billers, lifting a huge administrative burden from their shoulders and drastically reducing the need for patient outreach. No more unanswered phone calls or questionnaires seeking insurance information that patients may not have; third-party liability discovery solutions can automate the heavy lifting and return reliable, actionable information in a fraction of the time.

Why Providers Can’t Afford To Overlook Third-party Liability Discovery

For any providers wondering whether this technology can make a difference in their operations, the potential ROI is compelling.  Imagine being able to identify all available coverage sources and increase reimbursement rates for complex claims — automatically and with reduced patient outreach.

For example, ZOLL^® AR Boost^® Third-party Liability Discovery automatically finds up to 300% more overlooked third-party liability coverage, helping healthcare providers capture up to 40% higher reimbursement than from traditional payers. This means providers can bring in more revenue without adding headcount or overhauling current processes. 

With technology to help billers identify third-party coverage, hospitals can avoid incurring a financial loss and receive proper reimbursement — often at a higher rate than contracted commercial payers would yield.

Even with mounting financial pressures and many looming uncertainties, hospitals have options for helping to reduce uncompensated care expenses. By adopting savvy RCM optimization strategies and implementing technology like third-party liability discovery, they can help offset lost revenue streams with new ones. To learn more, visit www.zolldata.com/arboost-TPL

ⁱ American Hospital Association, February 2022, https://www.aha.org/fact-sheets/2020-01-06-fact-sheet-uncompensated-hospital-care-cost. Accessed 21 Aug. 2025.

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