The Healthcare Financial Management Association (HFMA) builds bridges between healthcare professionals and the financial aspect of the industry. HFMA’s goal is to establish a fiscally healthy industry, providing knowledge, education and resources for healthcare professionals to advance their careers and garner leadership tools via a Continuing Professional Education (CPE) program. The HFMA website includes forums that focus on different aspects of the trade and allow participants to engage with their peers.
Initiatives
The Industry Initiatives tab at the bottom of the page includes The Value Project, enabling healthcare organizations to “create value for multiple purchasers of healthcare.” This is the journey of interviewing healthcare providers, gathering information to develop value-based systems, and researching the necessary skills and tools.
Next, the Price Transparency page offers a consumer guide that compares costs between competitors, answers questions about healthcare providers and manages their costs. This page also has links to definitions, reports, why it matters and more.
To simplify healthcare interactions, HFMA has a Patient Financial Communications page offering staff training and information on developing a well-communicating staff. This resource was designed to instruct healthcare providers how to effectively communicate with their patients and adopt a best-practice mentality to serve them best.
HFMA MAP’s initiative sets the standard for revenue cycle excellence in the healthcare industry. Organizations use MAP Keys to measure revenue cycle management, MAP App to track data and compare results, MAP Event to learn at an annual revenue cycle conference, and MAP Awards to get recognized.
The Physician Resources page offers a blog, top headlines, a magazine and field lessons on management and finance information. HFMA also has a monthly subscription entitled Physician Business Advisor where subscribers get insight, tools and resources designed for leaders. This includes training programs, articles and reports written for those that receive the e-newsletter.
Health Plan Resources offer a range of educational articles and posts devised to help health plan leaders navigate through challenges that may arise, as well as pleasant circumstances.
Events
The Annual National Institute (ANI) conference takes place June 25-28 in Orlando, Florida, covering strategies for collaboration, patients, shareholders and stakeholders. It offers 21 CPE hours for early sessions, keynote sessions, featured speaker sessions, leadership labs and breakout sessions (some require prerequisites). Attendants of the conference may take advantage of Disney World tickets, networking opportunities and over 400 businesses on exhibition.
The Revenue Cycle Conference is a MAP event, bringing together healthcare industry employees that work together to improve the revenue cycle performance.
Education and Certification for Healthcare Professionals
HFMA also includes educational Seminars and Webinars. The seminars are in-person events included at the Revenue Cycle Conference, ANI and another event entitled HFMA Seminars in San Diego, CA (August 9 – 11). This seminar block 
includes a training and reference manual. The webinars are offered live on the website, free for members and $99 for non-members. These webinars apply toward CPE credits.
HFMA also offers on-demand webinars (not available for CPE credit) that are available one year after they were featured as live webinars.
For those unavailable to travel, Virtual Conference is a live, interactive experience, offering online networking opportunities and three CPE credits. It is free for members and $175 for non-members (but includes a one-year membership).
The wide range of certifications offers a cross section of information to improve the trade and bridge gaps between knowledge, practices and standards. These certifications may include a combination of accounting, finance and management to optimize the business intelligence in the business. They also represent 10 – 14 hours of CPE credit and cost about $400 for both HFMA members and non-members. Certifications include:
- Certified Specialist Managed Care (CSMC)
- Certified Specialist Business Intelligence (CSBI)
- Certified Specialist Physician Practice Management (CSPPM)
- Certified Healthcare Financial Professional (CHFP)
- Certified Specialist Accounting and Finance (CSAF)
- Certified Revenue Cycle Representative (CCRCR)
Certifications all include 10 – 14 hours of CPE credit and are about $400 for both HFMA members and non-members.
The Career Center has links to job listings and instructional tools on how to build a good team and manage careers. HFMA also offers a career opportunities newsletter and self-assessments to assist in choosing a career.
Publications
HFMA has six different publications, targeted at different roles in the healthcare industry. HFM magazine includes articles and columns featured on this website only. For a Wall Street Journal-esque feel, Leadership magazine provides information on healthcare redesign, quality and cost, technology, strategy and leader skills to hospitals, physicians and payers. The magazine also has a blog for more information and opinions by industry leaders.
The news page offers articles covering healthcare business and political news.
The HFM blog covers topics written by doctors, nurses and executives offering their thoughts, advice and opinion on topics such as emergency medicine, value based care, bundled payments and more.
The HFMA Newsletter and e-bulletins are available by subscription only, but offer job postings, financial strategies and Leaderships monthly newsletter. The Newsletters themselves are e-blast distributions covering different topics to support healthcare professionals.
HFMA also publishes a Buyers Resource Guide which helps vendors find companies with a data-base like system. This is beneficial for businesses to get listed and found by healthcare professionals.
Online Market Place
Job Bank is mentioned in various places on the site and is a great way to find jobs.
The Peer Review page is a program that allows HFMA members to identify what business solutions their peers are using and to find new services enabling members to save money and find faster solutions.
Viewers can easily connect with HFMA on their forums as well as the social channels LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.
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