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Simple ways to maximize the ROI of your EHR!

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EHR ROI

Are you working towards increasing the ROI of your EHR?

  An EHR can cause havoc. It is a well-documented fact. There is widespread disruption to workflow and your staffs are preoccupied in getting the system up and running. So how do you come out at the other end unscathed and most importantly profitable? There are a few ways to increase the return on investment of your electronic health record.

As always it begins with starting out with a clear-cut agenda. This will help in keeping you on track as it is a long drawn out process. Losing the plot mid-way is not going to be feasible off course.

Customize because a system that doesn’t work the way you do is a costly mistake!

The major reason why doctors don’t see an increase in revenue after an EHR is a part of their practice, is because the system guzzles up time and effort. Blame it on unnecessarily complicated systems that have a zillion options and templates for one single task. Or on vendors who are never around when you need them the most.

Fortunately, several EHR experts offer template customization services. Practice-specific EHR templates can instantly speed up workflow and cut short the time wasted on locating information.

Manage appointments better!

As everybody is busy complaining about how difficult it is to document medical information the upsides of using an EHR is forgotten. It allows physicians to cull out patient information like never before! Club patients who share a common denominator like patients who are covered by workers compensation, patients who come in for regular wellness checkups, etc. and meet them on a, scheduled day.

This will streamline your scheduling process and help you meet more patients? How does it increase your ROI? Well, if you can meet just two more patients per week, at an average of 150 dollars a patient, you can earn 1200 more dollars every month.

Work steadily towards the Meaningful Use incentive…

A medical practice can increase the ROI of its EHR by achieving Meaningful Use. Experts across the healthcare industry agree that achieving Meaningful Use is the ultimate ROI for medical practices. Work towards achieving MU and for tips click here.

And above all, encourage your staff members to throw in their two cents about increasing the productivity and profitability of your practice, post EHR implementation. The fact that you can think of new strategies to increase profitability, work collectively towards  a single goal and create more structured workflow processes is possibly the best return on investment you can get from your EHR.

Is your medical practice ready for Meaningful Use audits?

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Tips To Face MU Audits

Prepare your medical practice for CMS audits

A recent statistic reveals that one in twenty practices that have attested for MU will face an audit. And that most practices are most likely to face pre-payment audits. The increased governmental scrutiny can catch practices off-guard. Several hospitals maintain a ‘Book of evidence’ in case auditors come knocking by.

Attesting for Meaningful Use is not enough! Medical practices should ensure they can face audits head-on and have the requisite medical documentation.

Tips to become audit ready!

  • Always be ready! The best to insulate your practice from audits and fines is to be prepared. Always save the electronic documentation that supports your attestation. Save the documentation that has the values you entered in the Attestation Module for Clinical Quality Measures. Also, ensure that your payment calculations are carefully documented.
  • Your primary documentation includes the time period of the report, the denominators and numerators for the CQMs and evidence that it was created for that particular EP, hospital or medical center. Additional documentation includes a clear review of medical records. And documents to prove and support each measure attested for.
  • Most providers make the mistake of hating CMS auditors with a vengeance! It is important to comply with audit requests promptly. Providers should have pertinent document in hand after they receive the initial request letter from the contractor. Providing sketchy documents and one line statements will do more harm than good. Detailed, precise and evidence based documentation is required.
  • Medical care providers should stop being backseat drivers. Relying on admin staff or practice managers too much can be a risky proposition. Physicians should stay in the loop, verify documentation, analyze medical care records and medication lists. It is mandatory for every physician to make sure their patient records are accurate. As the slant is on evidence based care there is no better person than physicians to verify the veracity of documents.
  • Is your EHR certified? Receive documentation from the vendor stating that they are CHERT certified. The Office of the National Coordinator maintains a list of certified EHR products. Monitor upgrades and verify that your system meets evolving guidelines and measures. Get a copy of the licensing agreement with your vendor to submit to the auditors.
  • Conduct a thorough security risk assessment of your medical practice. Check if your practice is compliant with the existing security regulations. Not conducting an extensive security risk assessment periodically, can trip you up when the auditors reach your practice.

Is all these tips helpful for you? Tell us how your prepared for Meaningful Use Audits?

Why are physicians disillusioned with their EHRs?

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Why are physicians disillusioned with their EHRs?

40% of physicians are unhappy with their EHRs! The reason behind their disillusionmen

The healthcare industry is poised for change. Archaic paper records are making way for svelte, new electronic medical records that can transform the way physicians work. Sounds like a perfect dream.

Except for the fact, several physicians find working with EHRs a nightmare and would rather go back to paper records. Critics say that it is a passing fad. A case of “I hate my EHR too”. But there is a screw loose somewhere…

Point, click and wait till patients lose their cool!

Having to put up with bad hardware, cumbersome templates and poorly designed interfaces are one reason why physicians hate their electronic records with a passion. And God forbid if there is a power outage or fluctuating bandwidth. Stuck with a workflow that doesn’t work or flow is the reason for such widespread dissatisfaction.

Qualifying for Meaningful Use is a huge task in itself. EHRs that do not match MU requirements compound the problem further.

Doctors don’t belong to the stone ages…

Contrary to what people think physicians are not averse to using technology. From, using lasers, fiber optics and scanners to iPhones, physicians have always been tech savvy. The argument of healthcare professionals falling behind times doesn’t hold any water.

 Physicians find EHRs clunky and the fact that they are not mobile. Most EMR systems have been frustratingly slow in going mobile and some of them haven’t even taken the first baby steps towards mobile technology. It is not technology but how complicated and expensive it is that is the major problem.

Well-intentioned but the outcome counts as well!

There is no doubt that healthcare technology is liberating, more integrated and super quick. The major shortcoming of EHRs is that that they are not centered on the needs of physicians. It is on the other hand governed by federal mandates.

EHR vendors should stop playing by the rules of bureaucrats and develop systems that benefit their end users. Healthcare professionals are consumers of HIT. And should be given the kind of importance, consumers of other products enjoy. That could probably be the only lasting solution to the problem of disgruntled EHR users.

Tiger Team Checks the EHR Feasibility with Accounting of Disclosures Proposals

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Tiger Team checks EHR Feasibility

The Policy – Technology Equilibrium

In a recent convention of Privacy and Security Tiger Team, it was advised to the HIT Policy Committee that pilot projects must be instated to scrutinize the pragmatism of technical ability of electronic health record (EHR) systems – to revise requirements for accounting of disclosures of protected health information (PHI) and to create the access reports for patients’ utility.

 The Outlook of Pilot Testing

The Tiger Team is set to buttress the federal regulators of Healthcare IT Policy in an endeavor to assess the technical feasibility of EHR with requirements of accounting of disclosures. Furthermore, it aids scrutiny of prospective stages of HITECH Act’s EHR certification program.

To accomplish the HITECH incentives, eligible professionals (EPs), eligible hospitals (EHs) and critical access hospitals (CAHs) must perform “meaningful use” of certified EHRs. In that, patient engagement is a further mandatory requirement for the eligible entities. The pilot project envisages all these requirements’ harmony with the technological aspects.

 A Lesson Learnt from the Mistakes

In May 2011, the Office for Civil Rights (OCR), proclaimed the proposed rulemaking for overhauling the accounting of disclosures requirements under HIPAA. This proposal was said to be wrongly pitched and it engendered copious grievances from many healthcare providers with a unified aim to protest the controversial new “access report” provision.

The new “Access Report” must encompass the following data:

  1. Date and time of access.
  2. Name of the person or practice evaluating the PHI.
  3. A note on the information.
  4. A description of the user action (Is information created, modified or deleted?).
  5. EHR disclosures for treatment, operations and payment.

Many of the suggestions posted on the walls of HHS on the access report proposal underscored that it would prove to be technically impracticable, intricate and expensive to execute.

 The Roadmap to New Regulations

  1. The Pilots deem that they have formulated the final recommendations which will be presented to the HIT Policy Committee on 4th December 2013.
  2. Then, these suggestions would be analyzed by the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT and the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office for ‘Civil Rights’.
  3. These two entities of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) would devise any new ultimate regulations.

 Access Report – What to include and what not?

The tiger team throws a clear recommendation that patients must enjoy “high-level transparency” with respect to their data use and disclosures. Besides, it seems that it will narrow down the disclosure restrictions so that only the third parties outside the healthcare enterprise may be concerned.

In this milieu, Egerman emphasizes the philosophy “less is more” – as per which only the filtered, pertinent details must be passed on the patients so as to avert confusions and safety hazards of EHR users.

“Baker suggests that for the safety of healthcare workers, names of individuals accessing patients’ healthcare records could be sieved from the “access reports” issued to the patients, but accessible to the healthcare entity when inspecting allegations or suspicion of inappropriate access.”

 Finally, Tiger team accentuates that the EHR system must be tuned in line with the final regulations of this pilot project.

Smartphones Can Help Your Practice To Achieve MU !

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What do you do when you go meet a physician ? Explain in detail about your medical history and pray that you haven’t left out anything. Now you just need to hand your smartphone to the doctor. The trend of accessing medical data through smartphones is growing at a fast clip.

And major smartphones such as iPhone and Android apps offer applications to, store, download, and manage patient information.

A success story…

The University of Pittsburgh Medical center found that patients joining the medical practice’s patient portal grew exponentially after reports were available through smartphones. The project launched in 2011 has been a roaring success with 700 patients joining the portal every week. Patients’ being able to access their medical records is a major criterion for qualifying for MU. And smartphones have just made it easier for doctors!

How do you get Mrs Linder interested ?

Despite the optimism and euphoria surrounding the success of smartphones to help patients use patient portals, engaging them is a key issue. Mayo clinic found out the hard way that engaging patient is no easy task.

Patient engagement ; an on-going challenge…

When they launched a web based portal three years ago, 240,000 patients joined. Reason to celebrate! But wait. The clinic is having a tough time getting patients to using the portal. To receive MU dollars patients should use the patient portal. Patients who are too old or those who are suspicious of technology need to join the bandwagon as well.

Show that you care !

To engage patients it is important that patient portals are designed from the patients’ perspective. Address their needs and make the portal fit in with their overall healthcare plan. Making the portal easily navigable and using images and text that are easy on the eye is important. And yes the assurance that their data is completely secure.

Not everybody understands encryption protocols or static passwords. Educate and train your patients in handling healthcare IT. Encourage patients to use graphical authentication techniques. And, to separate medical data, from, the other regular features, of their, mobile phones.

Fighting the good fight !

It can be frustrating, pointless and time consuming. But staying the course can help your practice not just receive MU incentive dollars and achieve compliance. But also make hundreds of your patients happy and more involved in their healthcare.

Here is the info-graphics with few stats on patient portal

patient-portal

Are Meaningful Use Guidelines Driving Physicians Round The Bend ?

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Are physicians being rushed towards achieving MU ?

According to some strange law in the healthcare universe, there is always going to be someone complaining. EHR adoption rates are up. But before, you feel that doctors have finally made peace with their ehrs. Recent studies indicate that switching to an EHR can lead to loss of revenue.

Research Speak !

A recent study by the University of Michigan shows that only 27% of practices have showed a positive return on the money invested in their EHR.  It cites rather alarmingly, that a physician loses $43,743 over 5 years after EHR adoption.

The research further reveals that the incentives for working with an EHR do help. But in a “very uneven way”

MU

Rushing headlong into EHR adoption can be the reason…

The rapid pace of adopting EHR’s, in the pell-mell to receive incentives, is being blamed for the loss of revenue. EHR adoption rates are increasing at breakneck speed leaving no time for data collection to catch up. It paints a very unhealthy picture. In the race to ace the EHR game, patients it is feared, can be left in the lurch.

Can Stage 3 of Meaningful Use turn out to be a nightmare ?

This seems to be the shared fear of everyone, from the AMA Executive Vice President and CEO James L. Madara. To, the small practice owner, three blocks away. Stage Three MU has additional and stricter measures, for physicians to meet.

Inter-operability continues to be a key issue. With serious flaws in EHR systems and their architecture, MU can prove to be a disaster waiting to happen.

There is reason to chin up !

Though, loss of revenue due to EHR implementation continues to be a haunting dream. Physicians can take heart in the fact that focusing on their revenue cycle maximization that can reverse their fortunes.

The study by the University of Michigan on EHR use, has found that the major difference between practices that lost money, and those that didn’t. Was, how they used their EHR’s, to increase revenue.

Medical practices that, concentrated on patient care, improved their billing process and focused on reducing denied claims, saw a positive change. It is time for medical offices to not just concentrate on achieving MU but also think of ways to improve their billing cycle.