Your Team Is Stretched Thin — Here’s Where It’s Quietly Hitting Your Bottom Line
Authored by – Alexandra Stephens
The Conversation Everyone Is Having
If you attended the AAOE 2026 Annual Conference in Louisville this April, you already know: staffing was a topic that came up in nearly every room. It will come to no surprise that Orthopedic practices across the country are struggling to hire, retain, and train qualified staff — and it is directly impacting financial performance. Leaders are being encouraged to rethink staffing models, reduce administrative drag, and build cultures that retain talent in a market where qualified candidates have more choices than ever.
Members left having exchanged challenges and real solutions with peers from across the country. But a critical question still needs to be addressed: Is your current infrastructure holding up under workforce pressure — or is it quietly bleeding revenue?
Where Workforce Instability Hits RCM Hardest
Staffing shortages affect every corner of a practice, but the revenue cycle is where the financial damage compounds most quickly — and most invisibly. Consider how staffing instability moves through your revenue cycle:
- Front-end turnover leads to eligibility errors, missed copays, and incorrect authorizations — creating downstream denials before a claim is ever submitted.
- Billing team burnout leads to delayed claims, missed appeal deadlines, and preventable write-offs. When experienced billers leave, the nuanced payer knowledge they carried leaves with them.
- Inconsistent workflows cause denial spikes. Every time a staff member changes, institutional knowledge walks out the door and the learning curve resets — often without anyone realizing the gap until denial rates climb.
- Undertrained staff create documentation gaps that reduce reimbursement. Coding accuracy, modifier selection, and medical necessity documentation all suffer when teams lack time for ongoing education.
- Limited bandwidth means in-office teams can’t keep up with payer policy changes, new prior authorization requirements, or evolving compliance standards — leaving preventable errors unaddressed and revenue at risk.
The data reinforces what many administrators already feel in their day-to-day operations. RCM department turnover averages nearly 20%, and organizations can lose up to $125,000 per open RCM position annually in delayed or lost reimbursements [1]. Turnover rates in medical billing range from 11% to 40% depending on the organization, and nearly 90% of hospital CFOs report labor shortages in their billing departments [2]. Meanwhile, a recent MGMA Stat poll found that 37% of medical group leaders ranked workforce investments — adding staff, improving retention, and adjusting compensation — as their top budget priority for 2026 [3]
RCM as the Stabilizer
In an unpredictable labor market, your revenue cycle can’t rise and fall with every resignation or hiring cycle. It needs to be the constant. A well-structured RCM operation, built on standardized processes, specialized expertise, and the right support model, delivers the consistency and stability that staffing alone simply can’t. The practices thriving right now have separated revenue cycle performance from workforce volatility — ensuring every claim is worked, every appeal is filed, and every dollar is pursued regardless of who is sitting in the chair on any given Monday morning.
A Question Worth Asking
When was the last time a staffing gap, a missed appeal, or a training shortfall cost your practice revenue that nobody noticed? If the answer is “I’m not sure” — that’s worth exploring. The practices that will lead in the years ahead are the ones asking that question now — honestly, proactively, and with the right partners at the table.
When staffing is unpredictable, your revenue cycle can’t be. Fellow Health Partners provides the expertise, and operational stability practices need to keep revenue flowing, even when teams are stretched thin. To assess your RCM readiness, email Alexandra Stephens at info@FellowHealthPartners.com for a confidential consultation.
About Fellow Health Partners
Fellow Health Partners specializes in revenue cycle management for medical groups, health systems and Ambulatory Surgery Centers and is committed to helping our clients improve their bottom line and grow their business by applying innovative medical business solutions.
We meet this commitment by fusing Technology, Talent, and Training to create a multi-faceted support system to meet our clients’ needs.
Founded by business professionals and clinicians, our end-to-end revenue cycle solutions integrate with our customers’ existing infrastructures to seamlessly streamline billing, collections, coding, unresolved denials, and related workflows.
FHP is focused on helping groups protect and grow their revenue through expert billing, coding, denial management, and advisory services.
References:
- “The Staffing Storm: How Workforce Shortages Are Crippling RCM Performance.” Currance Blog Series: Adjusting the RCM Sails for Success.November 6, 2025.
- Madden, Chris. “The State of Medical Billing & Collections Hiring and Recruitment in 2025: Market Analysis for Healthcare Leaders.” LinkedIn, Networks Connect.May 14, 2025.
- Reynolds, Keith A. “Medical Groups Plan 2026 Budget Boost for Workforce, MGMA Poll Finds.” Physicians Practice.November 19, 2025. (Citing MGMA Stat Poll, October 28, 2025.)
