Showing posts with label EMR Software. Show all posts
Showing posts with label EMR Software. Show all posts

Saturday, June 30, 2012

The Amazing Flexible and Customizable EMR


Think of purchasing an EMR software solution as buying a new car.  Pick your preferred manufacturer and know that whatever you choose, you’ll at least end up with an engine, a chassis, a body and four wheels automatically.  EMR software works in a similar fashion - it automatically comes with a means of retrieving, documenting and processing patient history and encounters, no matter what.  Like buying a car, there are many add-ons and customizations that create the best EMR to suit each physician’s individual needs. 

Flexibility in an EMR solution is an important function to maximize the usability and value to the physician or practice.  A urologist might be able to use only bits and pieces of a family practice EMR.  Urologists do see both males and females, young and old, like a family practitioner, but the exam templates for the whole body won’t do them much good – they need in-depth templates focused on mainly just the uro-genital area.  “Our format is so easy, that we have preloaded specific templates ready to use,” says Bizmatics sales rep, Anthony Bates, regarding their PrognoCIS EMR solution.  Choosing the right templates for the specialty allows physicians to utilize all of the features and get their money’s worth.

Customizations within the specialty templates personalize an EMR to the individual physician or procedure.  EMRs serve as a check list when documenting a procedure.  Understandably, the same procedure may slightly differ depending on the patient; the physician can easily change the value of a field in that check list through dropdown boxes either before the encounter or during.  For instance, in pain management, a cervical spine injection may generally use a specific gauge of needle, but for whatever reason, a larger size may be required for this particular patient.  “They can check off variations of the procedure, such as needle size or probe electricity strength for nerve stimulation,” explains Kemp Stephens, another Bizmatics sales rep.  Customization of the interface and templates increases user comfort and workflow productivity as well as increase the accuracy of captured data.  

Monday, January 2, 2012

Beyond EMR Software: Health IT Trends of 2012

2011, without a doubt, was the Year of Meaningful Use and EMR.  For 2012, Tech Crunch published their health technology trend predictions of the New Year; their predictions point toward the rise in mobile device technology that functions complimentary to EMR software.  The technology trends this year bring patients and doctors closer together through the sharing of mobile medical data and bring patients closer to each other with expanding social networks.

Smartphone Devices

In 2012, your iPhone or Android device could save your life.  If not save it, greatly improve the quality of your health.  Although not yet approved for sale in the U.S., device accessories to monitor vital statistics are rapidly advancing.  By then end of this year, you could be using your iPhone as an electrocardiogram while your doctor watches in realtime as the data transmits to EMR software.  Other mobile device accessories in the works include glucometers and otoscopes.

Cloud Diagnosis

Through imaging and data sent from smartphone devices, diagnoses can be made from remote locations using cloud technology by either a physician or artificial intelligence.  Pattern-based fields of medicine such as dermatology and gynecology will benefit from this technology.  Rashes, moles and pap smears are submitted to the cloud for the shape and pattern to be analyzed by AI for abnormalities.  Smartphone apps for cloud diagnosis refer users to doctors in their area if abnormalities are found.

eConsultations

The rise in popularity in electronic medical consultations, or eConsultations, has been mentioned on this blog before.  Usually through patient portal membership, patients communicate questions and concerns with their doctor via email, text or telephone for a small fee, meaning less trips to the doctor.  TechCrunch takes it up a notch and claims audio-video communication Jetson's-style via Skype, FaceTime and FaceChat will become the eConsultation norm and a HIPAA-compliant system needs to be devised for this form of communication.

Social Networking

The wild popularity of Facebook and LinkedIn makes people willing to share information that would make our parents blush - well, mine at least.  Some personal details are TMI, but others could end up benefiting others.  Health information-based social networking sites are also predicted to emerge in 2012.  Social networking sites like CureTogether and PatientsLikeMe let patients share and consolidate health information. They serve as one part fellowship for those with similar medical conditions and histories and equal part database for clinical studies.  Clinical data from EMR software can be pooled together to run clinical trials based on geographic region.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

EMR Software Implementation Opens the Health IT Job Market

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has predicted a strong growth in EMR software vendors do not recruit "technology" types, but rather recent college graduates who may have an English or History degree. They do intense recruiting on college campuses across the country to find the smartest and hardest workers to enter their work force.

So if you're looking for a job, consider a hospital, doctor's office, government organization or EMR provider. It looks like the HITECH Stimulus Act will offer some job security that is hard to find at the moment.

Check out these sites for current openings:

www.healthcareitconsulting.com
http://emrandehr.jobamatic.com/a/jobs/find-jobs
http://www.justemrjobs.com/
http://emrjobs.net/

Thursday, August 18, 2011

Study Shows Patients Are Wary About EMR Implementation

According to a recent Harris Interactive survey, patients still aren't entirely excited about their doctor's EMR implementation in the office.  The survey asked patients questions about their concerns with security, confidentiality and who really benefits from EMRs.  The patients’ legitimate concerns can be easily placated by just sitting down and talking to them about the new system.

The biggest apprehension patients had about their doctor implementing an EMR software program is that their medical information could get stolen by hackers.  Another security concern was that their medical information could be misused.  With all the hacking stories in the news, it’s justifiable.  System hacking can be best prevented by having separate passwords for each application.  It is also important to purchase only Certified EMR products that meet data protection standards.  Also, it is important to explain to the patients that the same HIPAA regulations apply to electronic records as paper ones and medical records can only be accessed with a password.

Another concern patients had was that they aren’t really to benefit from an electronic system.  They see it is just a way for doctors to speed through patients faster.  The patient may not be able to play with the PC tablet and push the buttons, but in the end, it’s all for their benefit.  Yes, having an EMR will speed up doctor work flow but it will allow for the doctor to see more patients in a day/week then in the past.  Procedures as well as medication names and doses will be electronically coded which will lead to fewer errors due to the elimination of having to read messy handwriting. 

The good news is that 42% of patients really do believe that EMR implementation would lead to better and more efficient care (as long as it works the way it’s supposed to) and, in the end, is a necessary step in medical technology.