Healthcare IT Solutions Market USA: Insights and Opportunities

Information technology has found its applications in each and every industry and US healthcare industry is not an exception to the rule. Till date, the investments in the healthcare IT solutions was very low, for the very reason that the healthcare industry was of the opinion that it has nothing to do with information technology. The industry believed that the qualification, knowledge and skills of healthcare professionals are the only requirements, however, the industry has realized that healthcare IT solutions can extend an helping hand in achieving reduction in costs, saving time, improving productivity and most importantly, improving patient care.

Healthcare IT solutions include a number of software, hardware and networking solutions for individual providers, managed healthcare, hospitals, medical billing companies and health insurance providers. The main concern among providers is that the system should be in a position to streamline the whole process of practice/patient management. It should also bring about the reduction in costs and time spent with improved patient care. Much attention in the healthcare IT market has focused on opportunities to expand the use of electronic medical record (EMR) and electronic health record (EHR) systems.

Healthcare IT solutions like EMR/EHR systems come in different versions and capabilities. There are instances when the requirements for a particular practice may differ from the requirements of another practice. According to a recent research report from CompTIA, 34 percent of healthcare providers report using a comprehensive EMR system, while 16 percent says they’re using a partial system. The remaining 29 percent are either evaluating their options or 20 percent have not yet started the process of implementation of EMR. However, in case of implementation of EMR the satisfaction rate is higher among doctors as compared to any other healthcare systems.

Among the developed nations, US has one of the best healthcare systems in the world. At approximately 17% of GDP, the U.S. healthcare market represents one of the largest and fastest growing sectors of the U.S. economy. The healthcare administration is a tedious task, and thus showing an urgent need from the healthcare IT solutions industry for IT systems that can streamline the whole process of healthcare industry. According to certain research studies, almost half of the US healthcare professionals are poised to double their IT investments in the next 12 months. This provides with a tremendous opportunity for healthcare IT companies to bring about IT products and solutions in the market that best suits the industry. 

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management

EMR - A Paperless Clinic, Improved Patient Care & Increased Revenue

Electronic Medical Records (EMR); its all about automation, taking advantage of information technology, converting a physicians clinic into a paperless facility,  bringing about improvement in patient care, integration of patient history, test results, diagnosis, treatment, eligibility verification, submission of claims, smooth patient management and last but not least “increased revenue”.

The world is changing and why not a physicians clinic? People are taking advantage of information technology in each and every field may be service industry, manufacturing industry, educational field and so on. Till date, healthcare industry had minimum investment on information technology; however, the situation is changing with systems like electronic medical records (EMR) being introduced in the market.

The healthcare industry or a physician’s clinic can not be an exception to the rule. The healthcare industry has understood the importance of the role of information technology. The healthcare industry is getting transformed through IT (information technology).  A no. of clinical tests, medical and surgical procedures have become possible due to the use of IT systems. A physician’s clinic or a hospital has also understood the advantages that they can fetch through the implementation of IT system like electronic medical records (EMR).

The healthcare IT systems like electronic medical records (EMR), practice management system (PMS) and more are changing the way of life of medical professionals as well as patients. For healthcare professionals it is the ease of patient & practice management, improved revenues where as patients are getting better care and safety. The health IT systems are capable of managing the patient information in a better way thus reducing the chances of errors. Physicians are getting more time to spend on diagnosis and treatment ensuring better care and safety.

It wouldn’t be wrong to conclude that healthcare IT systems like electronic medical records (EMR) is a win – win situation for both physicians as well as patients.

Evaluating Existing Practice Management System (PMS)

A practice management system has become a must have for today’s physician’s office. A good system helps to speed up the overall process of practice management. The tasks can be managed with minimum efforts and a large no. of man hours can be saved. The practice management system not only helps in saving time and money but it also helps the healthcare professionals to concentrate on their core line of service, thereby resulting into improved quality of service and overall patient satisfaction.

Not all practice management systems are alike. They differ on various parameters – technical issues, functionality, legal requirements & security issues. Hence, not all systems can deliver desired results. The system also needs to be updated from time – time by the vendor taking into consideration the laws & policies passed by the government. New & improved technology is often introduced in the market; the system needs to be updated with the advanced technology so that the system is in a position to compete in the market.

A practice might have already implemented a particular practice management system; however, it would be advisable to evaluate the existing system on various parameters. If the system does not meet the desired level of competency it should be upgraded or a newer system must be implemented. It is true the migration to a newer system is not an easy task as it involves cost as well as time resources, however, an incompetent system would result into wastage of resources rather than achieving optimum use.

In order to evaluate an existing practice management system it is advisable:

-    to assess areas of operations essential to your office efficiency
-    to use your distinct assessment to evaluate potential practice management systems
-    to manually score and summarize evaluation results
-    to compare the performance of individual practice management systems
-    to use overall results to select a practice management system

One may also make use of a no. of online evaluation tools that provide with the different categories and sub options to choose from. A person has to review each feature (sub-option) by choosing from the available options like essential, useful and not necessary to rank each feature. The final score chart can be used to decide as to level of competency of the practice management system. 

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management 

Benefits of Using Practice Management System (PMS)

A practice management system (PMS) is an integrated medical software designed for the use by doctor’s & physician’s office. The system aims at simplifying the process of practice management by providing a number of functionality including appointment scheduling, patient record maintenance, claims management, billing management and more.

Often doctors and physicians are confused as to the implementation of the practice management system. Initially it involves purchase and implementation cost. Training is also an important factor – people once used to the manual system find it difficult to switch over to the newer automated system. However, the implementation of the system results into a no. of benefits.

Benefits of Implementation of Practice Management System are as follows - Increased Patient Volume, Enhanced Productivity, Minimization of Claim Rejection, Elimination of Errors, Expedition of Payments, Reduction in Denials, Ensuring Regulatory Compliance and Increased Customer Satisfaction.

 It wouldn’t be wrong to say that the end result of a well-planned practice management system is enhanced productivity, improved revenue, better profit margins and patient satisfaction.

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management

Practice Management System (PMS) – What to Look For?

A practice management system is a hi-tech new age IT tool for today’s doctors and physicians. The system has its own advantages in the overall process of practice management. It helps in speeding up the process of practice management, minimization of errors, improvement in the quality of service and overall office profits. The success of implementation by and large depends on features offered by the practice management system itself.

Before actually purchasing and implementing the system – it would be really wise enough to list out the requirements of your practice and then to tally it with the different practice management systems before finalizing on a particular software. There are certain essential features that a good & efficient system would always be equipped with.

Let us look at the various important functionalities that a good practice management system must be equipped with:

Appointment Scheduling:

A good practice management system must provide with the feature of appointment scheduling. It should provide for the option for checking the availability of time slot, online appointment scheduling, editing and other options for maintaining the patient appointment record.

Billing & Collections:

A busy practice has to deal with the tedious task of issuing bills to the patient, record keeping and collections. It involves a number of entries in the books to keep the records up-to-date. A good practice management system must provide with easy to use fully functional patient billing and collections module.

Electronic Medical Records:

Maintaining patient history, clinical records, treatment records & other patient information is a time consuming process. A good practice management system usually provides with the functionality to maintain patient records.

Insurance Claims Management:

Medical claims management is a tedious process involving a number of steps including claim generation, claim submission, verification, error handling, follow up and so on. It is considered to be the most time consuming activity that a physician’s office has to deal with. A good practice management system helps to ease out the situation by providing a number of claims management capabilities.

Patient Records Maintenance:

Maintaining patient records is not an easy task. Recording, filing, storing, retrieval and updating are the usual activities as regards patient records maintenance. A good practice management system would essentially provide with the capabilities of managing patient records.

Reporting:

Report generation is a periodic and very important task. Many decisions are based on good reporting systems. A good practice management system provides with the capabilities of generating different reports on the basis of the information stored and thus facilitating the process of decision making.

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management

What is Medical Practice Management System?

Practice Management System (PMS) is a new age IT tool for practicing doctor’s and physicians. The healthcare professionals has to deal with a no. of tasks such as patient appointment scheduling, recording patient history, maintaining treatment records, claims submission and reimbursement issues. Advanced information technology has made it possible to introduce IT tools like PMS for the healthcare industry. The new age IT tool “Practice Management System (PMS)” makes the job of managing the practice easy.

The practice management system (PMS) is an integrated software tool. The software is designed in such a way that it can easily interact with other healthcare information tools so as to bring about meaningful patient information. The information is stored in central database and thus provides with the capability of sharing the data with other software tools. System integration is a very important functionality as it helps to cut down the redundancy in data storage.

An advanced practice management system (PMS) usually includes the following features to make it a fully functional system for doctors and physicians: Patient Registration, Eligibility Verification, Authentication Check, Claim Generation, Claim Submission, Medical Coding, Charge Entry and cash posting, A/R Denial Management, A/R Collections and follow-up, Medical Billing, Charge Capture & coding, Patient Follow-up and Third Party payment compliance.

The importance of practice management system (PMS) in the doctor’s or physician’s office can not be denied. It makes the job easy – availability of the time slot and registration can be accomplished with just a mouse click. Eligibility verification can be done before providing for the service codes. Claims submission, claims generation and tasks can be completed with a single click. The end result of implementing a PMS is saving of time and man hours, reduction in errors, better quality of service and over all patient satisfaction.

Tags:  Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management

EMR System – A Case Study

The main objective of any EMR System is to bring about the overall computerization of the patient medical records. Switching-off from the manual record maintenance to electronic record maintenance ensures a no. of advantages to the providers. Here is a case study that demonstrates the successful implementation of the system and its outcome.

Brief Description of Practice:

Established in the year 1989, Fort Wayne Neurological Center (FWNC) is the region's premiere center for neurological medicine. The Center is equipped with ten specialized patient-focused institutes of care. The Center has 20 physicians who are supported by a staff of nurses, medical assistants and medical secretaries in addition to teams of clinical professionals in the areas of Diagnostic Testing, Nuclear Imaging, Ambulatory Surgery, Sleep Medicine and Research.

FWNC has two main offices in Fort Wayne, Indiana and routinely treats patients in a 90 mile radius of Fort Wayne including northeast Indiana, northwest Ohio and south-central Michigan. The Center also maintains regional clinics in Indiana and Ohio, as well as at all area medical and specialty hospitals.

Web Chart Implementation:

The practice implemented WebChart in a phased approach, starting with document management as a way to store records and replace paper charts. At first, none of the doctors were using WebChart in a clinical setting. Initially, the medical records staff used the system, and the physicians could print the bar-coded documents they needed on demand. Following clinical encounters, completed forms were scanned and auto-indexed into WebChart. Over time, more functionality was added so that the physicians could use PCs to view patient information in WebChart, rather than on paper. Now, all of the prescriptions and orders go out electronically and physicians can view records and images on their home PCs.

Outcome:

The total cash savings or increased revenue from the EMR system amounted to $250,500 per year, broken down as follows:

•    Printed materials savings: $62,490
•    Storage for old medical charts: $16,000
•    Legal disability media record copying: $52,000
•    Lowered clinical staff cost: $120,000

Web Chart is one of the features of EMR System. A fully integrated EMR System provides with a number of important features for both physicians as well as patients. If the entire system is implemented successfully, it could result into huge savings, improved revenue, patient satisfaction and quality service.

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management

Benefits of EMR System (Electronic Medical Record System)

A fully integrated EMR System helps in easy storage, retrieval and modification of patient medical records. IT (Information Technology) has taken the world by storm and health care industry is not an exception to the rule. Computerization of patient medical records whether an individual physician or a hospital has its own advantages:

Easy Storage – The EMR System provides for easy storage of patient medical information. The modules and templates are designed in a manner to make the data input task effortless.  The information is stored in a central database and thus facilitating the integration of the data.

Integration – The EMR System is designed in such a way that it facilitates the integration of data. The information that which is stored in the central database helps other systems like billing, patient portal and other health information systems to share the database and provide with the meaningful information.

Timely Access – Access to patient medical records is of utmost importance as it helps in the process of diagnosis and treatment. Under emergency situations there is very little or no time to have access to medical records. This creates great difficulty for the health care professionals in deciding on a number of issues. An efficient EMR System resolves this difficulty. The records can be accessed by health care professionals from any where with just a mouse click.

Improved Quality – The EMR System provides with the necessary medical history of the patient, thus facilitating decision making. The system also helps in saving of time and thus allowing the health care professionals to concentrate on their main service, which in turn results into improved health care quality.

Reduction in Costs – The EMR System helps in eliminating the need to maintain the records on paper. It also eliminates the need to maintain large number of files and thus minimizing the need for storage space. The system also helps in cutting down the redundancy. Owing to above factors the system helps in saving large no. of man hours and other resources that ultimately results in to reduction of costs. 

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management  

Standard Features of EMR System

An electronic medical record system (EMR System) is integrated medical software developed with the purpose of computerizing the whole process of medical records maintenance. The system can be implemented by a hospital or doctor’s clinic. EMR system tends to be a part of a local stand-alone health information system that allows storage, retrieval and modification of records.

Let’s consider standard features of the best electronic medical record systems (EMR Systems) available on the market today:

Fully Integrated EMR System: A good EMR System always makes use of a central database and hence is in a position to integrate with other modules like billing, patient management and more.

EMR System & Online Prescription: Online Prescription or e-prescription is gaining momentum all across the world; more and more patients are resorting to online options for obtaining medical prescriptions. An effective EMR System always provides for the integration of the two modules to facilitate the overall process of prescription and storage of medical records.

EMR System & PQRI Automation: PQRI refers to Physician Quality Reporting Initiative.  PQRI is nothing but a set of quality-measures if met by physicians; they are entitled to a single consolidated incentive payment of 2.0% of the estimated total allowed charges for Medicare Part B covered services. A good EMR System is always equipped with PQRI automation features.

Integration of EMR System with Patient Portal: Advanced internet technology has changed the modus operandi of physician – patient interaction. Now-a-days, patients they prefer to schedule their appointments online, to access their medical records and to obtain online prescriptions. An advanced EMR System provides with the interoperability to function effectively with other information systems like patient portal.

EMR System with Customizable Templates: The information that needs to be entered may be classified into mandatory and optional. Hence, the template must be customizable in nature for the ease of entering the information. A good EMR System always provides with flexible templates that can be customized as per the requirement.

EMR System & Technical – Legal Requirements: There are numerous federal and state regulatory and compliance issues. Mandatory information needs to be filled up as per the stipulated guidelines. Having an EMR Solution that has guidelines programmed in (and is constantly updated by the vendor’s system) will keep you legally safe all year round. A good EMR System is usually developed taking into consideration the various technical & legal requirements. 

Tags: Healthcare Management | EMR | Practice Management