Reasons for the switch from EMRs to EHRs

Over the years, Electronic medical records (EMRs)  might have served your practice very well. However, all good things come to an end and it’s now time to move to a more comprehensive, interoperable solution; Electronic Health Records (EHRs). 

The reasons for this ‘switch’ can be classified into three sub-types:

•  You must move with technology to survive and grow in this extremely competitive industry.
•  Interoperability
•  Government incentives and penalties

The first point pertains to the survival of the fittest. A chef will fare a lot better with a running supply of gas in contrast to maintaining a fire that has been started by rubbing two stones. Moreover, the knobs on a gas-stove will allow him to set the heat he requires to create a perfect steak in lesser time.

Similarly, EMRs allowed the recording of clinical and medical data, facilitating the automation of charts and to enhance patient care. However, EHRs provide a more comprehensive patient history. Clinical support and decisions making is made a lot easier for the physicians in charge of administering care.

Patient care is advanced beyond a level which was once thought possible, and there is further room for growth. Interaction with patients is also enhanced via Patient Portals which allow doctors and patients to send and receive information including lab results, etc.

The second point, interoperability is generally viewed as the most significant difference between the two systems. In contrast to EMRs, EHRs are made in such a way that the information stored on the system is not constrained to the premises of a hospital; it can be electronically sent across locations including other hospitals, labs, radiology centers, payers, patients and other stakeholders.

And lastly, government regulations and requirements, most significantly the Stimulus Act have put huge pressure on healthcare providers to incorporate Information Technology (IT) into their everyday workflows. There are attractive incentives for those who start to “meaningfully use” certified EHR technology. Moreover, there are penalties for those who fail to do so.  

EHRs and EMRs both enhance the clinical aspects of a practice; however, the aforementioned reasons including interoperability put EHRs way ahead in terms of features and advantages.

Read more: EHR Breakups: A heartbreak for Practices

Remain competitive in the EMR market for more customers

Currently, healthcare IT is perhaps the most happening industry in the United States. The industry is going through complete transformation with the help of regulatory laws, innovative technology and becoming customer-centric.

The basic idea behind these changes is to manage health of Americans in a proactive manner, besides provide cost-effective and quality care to patients.

The major agent of change has been the technology, Electronic Medical Record (EMR) that manages large to small healthcare facilities in workflow management and making electronic records. EMRs have become a necessity for every physician, working in a hospital or running a practice, in order to meet Meaningful Use requirements.

This has resulted in mushroom growth of EMR vendors in last decade, which has made the market competitive. In order to survive this competition, vendors should bring these changes:

Cloud-based EMR

A web-based EMR can give an EMR Company a huge competitive edge, particularly among those that cater to small to medium size medical practices. These practices neither have space, not enough financial resources to maintain a server-based EMR.

Having a cloud-based EMR will allow the providers to bring their practice up-to-date with healthcare IT without having to spend extra money. If it’s a solo provider or small practice, they don’t have to move into a spacious office to set-up a server room for the technology.

Similarly, they wouldn’t have to hire one or a team of IT professional to look after the server. All they need is a computer and good internet connection to start working.

More importantly, Cloud-based EMR is relatively more protected than a server. EMR Vendors are equally responsible for HIPAA compliance when it comes to data protection and privacy. Moreover, physicians can access patient data out of office.

Make your EMR available on different platform and gadgets

Android, Apple, Windows, Blackberry – try to utilize every platform available to reach out to more customers that is physicians. With developments in healthcare IT, vendors are gradually turning to make their product more gadget-friendly.

Be it smart phone, laptop, iPad, notebook or any other gadget, physicians are using them and they would like to have software that functions as smoothly on a computer as on other gadgets.  

So, don’t be left out in this competition and develop EMR software that can attract more customers in the market. Also before creating an EMR read the EHR Software Reviews and know what the customers are asking for and what are their requirements for different EMRs.

Read more: Avoid EHR Switching Mistakes To Save Your Practice From Unnecessary Costs

What to focus on in online EHR software reviews?

Software Advice, Business Software and American EHR  are three of the numerous websites that provide Electronic Health Record (EHR) software reviews for hundreds of vendors.

In 2013, healthcare technology company Digital Assent conducted a survey of 341 respondents out of which 72% said that negative reviews would put them off visiting the particular practitioner. Just as provider ratings matter to patients, EHR ratings matter to providers.

There has been a growing trend of physicians visiting EHR Software Reviews and rating websites before purchasing a specific EHR. Many times, negative narrations by current users of the product cause potential clients to cross that product of their “suited-for-my-practice-list”.

The article will help you understand what you need to look at while visiting such sites. The article is relevant for both current EHR users looking to switch to a new system and those looking to purchase an EHR for the first time. 

For most physicians visiting such sites, they know the names of at least a few EHR vendors. I’d recommend you to search for them first and identify if they have the EHR essentials in their system. According to me, the essentials that an EHR vendor must give are:

1. Cloud-based system

2. Integrated solution (EHR and Practice Management)

3. Specialty-based solution

4. ICD-10 Preparedness

5. Meaningful Use Stage 2 Readiness

Look at the vendor’s features and any system which doesn’t offer these three should get a cross straight off.  

Next, look at other features that you want in your software. Examples could be clinical charting, E-prescriptions and anything else you require.  

Once you’ve done this, you’re probably left with a handful of vendors.  Now look at how current customers have rated and reviewed those vendors, particularly with respect to the features you require. The ones that do poorly in most of the features you require, cross them off.

Next, look for other vendors that possess the features you require and the essentials. Use the same selection process again to shortlist the vendors down till three.

Now schedule demos with these shortlisted three; get acquainted with the features and services they offer. Select the best one from them and there is a very small chance that you’ve chosen the wrong EHR for your practice.

Read more about: EHRs and Pay-for-Performance: The way forward for Primary Care?   

Using a medical billing company to safeguard your practice from ICD-10

There has been a lot of talk about the ideal medical billing company, particularly with respect to the intimidating ICD-10 changes which threaten to be a huge burden for practices.

A Black Book Rankings survey comprised of responses from over 20,000 trained and qualified users between November 2013 and April 2014 reported interesting findings; including this one on outsourcing medical billing. When asked about their practice’s operational priorities over the upcoming years, about 90 percent of single-physician and small practice physicians with in-house billers said they would potentially outsource most or all their billing-related functions over the next two years.

The preference for a medical billing vendor by smaller practices in particular looks to be a result of the complex nature of ICD codes, which make billing extremely time consuming.

ICD-10 is going to be big, and the new coding format mean that there are additional subdivisions for most diagnosis.  Moreover, the numbering will be completely different from what it was before.

And with ICD-10 and thousands of new codes almost upon us, physicians, especially those who understand the current codes; don’t want to go through the hassle of learning the codes all over again.

If we look at the advantages of using a professional billing company for ICD-10, the need for trained, competent and experienced billers is essential. They will have the necessary tools that are required to ensure that the billing progresses smoothly.

Moreover, any difficulty in billing that these professionals encounter is likely to be dealt with in significantly less time. This is because they will have experts for different dimensions of medical billing; and with these experts will have the option to solve problems among themselves. In contrast, one or two in-house billers at your practice encountering similar problems could take significantly longer to resolve such problems; resulting in potential collection delays and in turn lesser revenue for your practice.  

Other benefits of medical billing vendors include lower staff costs, faster claim reimbursement and lesser chances of fraud.

Must read about: Why Physician ICD-10 Fears are unfounded, CMS explains

Why does my practice need a medical billing company?

In our country, a medical billing service is the intermediary between a doctor and his payments. However, while the Health IT sector is flourishing, many providers are missing out on even greater revenues in the form of quicker claim processing and reimbursements. Can a medical billing company be that intermediary; a question on the lips of all providers.

Managing your practice is not a walk in the park with doctors having to manage their patients and in addition to working towards achieving Meaningful Use incentives and avoiding penalties, the ICD-9 coding process and the fear of the fast approaching ICD-10 diagnostic codes among other things.

How can an in-house biller or professional billing company change the doctor’s revenue cycle? The answer is simple; through the internet, the intermediary transmits insurance claims directly to the insurance. Yes there is a clearinghouse involved, but that’s for the biller to worry about. As a provider, you have one less aspect to manage.

In addition, Medicare prioritizes electronically submitted claims. Claims transmitted online take 10 to 14 days for payment, in contrast to paper-based claims, which can take approximately 27 days. With so many days saved, even more money is earned by the doctor.

Now comes the next question, in-house or outsourcing medical billing? There’s a pretty straightforward self-evaluation statement for this. With both avenues providing the same service; would you prefer dedicated billing staff, to which you’d have to allocate a separate room and computers? Or would you prefer a company with numerous billing professionals, who’d do everything to maximize your reimbursements, and who’d charge an extremely low percentage of your annual revenues for their services? 

The more practical choice would be to outsource your billing to a company who’d do all this for you, all without taking a large amount of space and money to carry out your services for you. Additionally, most EHR vendors offer to execute this service for you, which means that you don’t even have to worry about system compatibility issues.

Why Practices Should Switch To EHR Software?

Electronic Health Record (EHR) systems are transforming the healthcare industry by automating clinical processes of practices. Moreover, a portion of the 2009 Stimulus Act, the Health Information Technology Act (HITECH), aims to promote and establish EHRs for the whole country by 2014. If practices haven’t made the switch, here’s why they should:

1.   HITECH offers significant incentives (and penalties) based on “meaningful use” of certified EHRs

MeaningfulUse (MU) defines the use of Electronic Health Records (EHR) within an organization. 2014 is the last year to acquire Medicare incentives for MU Stage 1 (which begun in 2011).  If a provider fails to start reporting by July 1, 2014, he will not be able meet the 90-day reporting requirement, and subsequently fail to attest by the final October 1, 2014 deadline.

The Medicare penalty kicks in for providers who have failed to adopt EHR software within this deadline. Providers who are unable to start MU within the time bracket will be subjected to a 1% penalty of annual Medicare collections in 2015. The penalty will increase by one percent each year in following years until 2017 after which the penalties will vary depending on the percentage of eligible meaningful users. It should be noted that Medicare is taxable.

Additionally, the Medicaid incentive program will continue until 2016, after which providers will not be able to receive Medicaid benefits.

2.   Benefits for patients and practices

In addition to the legal requirements due to which providers are switching to EHR systems, there are numerous benefits for both the doctor and patient, via a switch to this system.

The clinical procedures of a practice will be made easier, safer and faster via EHR software. Features, for example, e-Labs by which orders and results can be sent and received online, respectively, save valuable time.

Patient portals allow for increased interaction with patients and allow lab results, reports and reminders to be transmitted online. This also saves time for both the practice and patient, in addition to lowering the number of visits a patient has to make to a practice.

Additionally, all the patient history and information is stored on EHR software which reduces errors, multiple tests and enhances the patient’s experience.

Other benefits of EHR systems include increased productivity, accelerated revenue cycle, enhanced compliance and lower costs.

3.   Benefits for the society

The society, as a whole, will also greatly benefit from EHR systems. The government is collecting data for research via these systems. Information on obesity, smoking trends, and other important conditions is being gathered. This information will be analyzed and worked upon to devise methods to counter these problems and to focus on preventive measures.

The article lists some of the most widely talked about benefits of EHR systems and how, on a broader front, the whole country will immensely benefit from adopting EHR software.

Cloud-based EHR best bet for Solo Physicians and Small Practices

Selecting the right technology for small practices can be a daunting task for various reasons including availability of financial and human resources and cost of technology among others. This has led to slow adoption of Electronic Health Record (EHR) among small practices.

The answer to their problems lies in Cloud-based EHR that allow small practices to implement the system with limited financial and human resources. Moreover, increasing number of vendors is offering this technology making the market competitive. This helps solo or small practices to shift from paper-based to electronic systems of records.

Cost-effective

Small practices do not have the capacity to make huge monetary investments in a server-based EHR that require space and IT personnel dedicated to maintenance of the system. By implementing Cloud-based EHR, providers can save huge sums of money. Also, right vendor selection can also help providers to get a suitable EHR deal.

Simple implementation process

 A smooth workflow is necessary for small practices to run their business successfully. Setting up a server room for the EHR and training the staff can take a lot of time that will result in loss of patients and revenue. On the contrary, a Cloud-based system will take less time to adopt and fully implement in practice workflows.

No maintenance hassle

While selecting the vendor, providers of small practices should ensure that they offer excellent customer support, as they are solely responsible for maintenance and upgrade of Cloud-based EHR. On one hand, this enables providers to focus entirely on their practice and patients, while on the other hand; poor customer support of the vendor will prove to be problematic.

EHR security is vendor’s responsibility

While using Cloud-based EHR, small practices don’t have to guard server rooms and ensure security of devices. Since electronic records are accessed through a browser, therefore, no information is lost if the devices are stolen or damaged. However, each provider –big or small – is responsible for implementing HIPAA laws at the practice.