Partnering With a Billing Consultant Is a Winning Move For Better EMR Adoption
It was believed that the EHR-Healthcare marriage would mature over time with both developing an appreciation of each other. But surprisingly the following statistics gleaned by AmericanEHR Partners, an organization founded by the American College of Physicians or ACP points to the contrary.
a. A survey of 4,279 clinicians found EHR satisfaction declined from 39% in 2010 to 27% in 2012.
b. Those who were “very dissatisfied” rose from 11% to 21% during the same period.
c. 2590 primary care practitioners in the Dept of Veterans Affairs received an average of 63 alerts per day through the EHR system.
d. 86% said this was excessive and 70% said it was more than they could manage.
e. It took on average 5 years for a physician or clinic to become familiar and become comfortable with the workings of an EHR.
REASONS FOR DISATISFACTION:
Though the meaningful use statute has provided adequate fillip for doctors to start using EHRs more effectively there have been umpteenth reasons for the above dissatisfaction. The chief among them are:
1. Rushed implementations when trying to meet meaningful use deadlines.
2. Many EHR vendors trying to rush up to deliver products to the burgeoning market, the victim sometimes being usability.
3. One size-fits all approach by many EHR vendors which resulted in products which could not adapt well to the physicians’ workflow and failed to meet expectations.
4. Last, but perhaps the most important, physicians and clinics themselves not assessing their needs adequately before homing in on an EHR product, this frequently resulted in mismatch sending the dissatisfaction levels high.
What’s the Solution?
EHRs are here to stay; medical records and other information are best stored in the electronic medium. But then how can we improve satisfaction levels and also decrease the time it takes for physicians to become comfortable with EHRs. Bruce Eckert’s, principal with Beacon Partners, a health care consulting group, insight on it is worth alluding to here:
“I have seen numerous implementations where the results met or exceeded everyone’s expectations, and I have seen numerous others where this was not the case. My observation is that the difference between these, the ‘secret sauce’ if you will, is the quality of the EHR implementation, not the software. All EHR vendors have very successful, very satisfied users, and others who are not.”
Why Do Failed Implementations Occur?
Failed implementations can happen due a variety of reasons, some of which we have mentioned above. “Meaningful use incentives created an artificial market for dozens of immature EHR products,” said Doug Brown, managing partner of Black Book Rankings. This means you have to be careful in choosing your EHR product. Good training of staff on a bad EHR product is not going to serve anyone’s end. Also, what is paramount is to see if the EHR products caters well to your particular speciality.
It is interesting to note that primary care physicians are the most satisfied of all EHR users while the surgeons are the least. This is certainly indicative of how the EHR market initially developed with just a general template, best suiting the primary care physicians, but optimized by other speciality practitioners to cater to their own needs.
The Solution:
EHR companies are basically IT companies that happen to focus on healthcare. Although many of them provide good support during implementation and also post sales, the need of the hour is for clinics to also partner with someone who have already implemented and are using these systems.
Also, rather than joining hands for this sole purpose, it would be ideal if clinics could also combine their RCM needs into the package. The only possibility that springs up then is the clinic’s medical billing or medical coding vendor, who already should be savvy about implementation, usage, and troubleshooting of EHRs.
