Although there are now ways for patients to check in before walking in to a healthcare facility, the kiosk still plays a large role in healthcare. A recent study that looked at 28,636 kiosk-based patient encounters found that check-in time decreased, daily gross and individual point of sale returns increased, and that more satisfaction surveys were completed by patients.
Just a month from now, on October 7 and 8, the 2021 eClinicalWorks and healow National Conference will be coming to a computer screen near you. Attendees will enjoy a Keynote Address, Product Showcase, and 60 breakout sessions focusing on the latest healthcare IT products and services we have to offer.
Dr. Kenneth LeCroy says his family primary care practice, Lighthouse Family Medicine, often has nurse practitioner students who are eager to know what each patient’s diagnosis is. As much as diagnoses matter, Dr. LeCroy offers these students a broader perspective.
People everywhere will turn to online marketplaces like Amazon® or eBay® to purchase gifts for friends and family. Now, imagine the frustration that would ensue if these companies made a decision to only allow access through a single browser and on a specific type of mobile device.
Users want the freedom to be able to access a website from any browser, on any device, and any operating system. This same need for independence and ease of use carries over when providers need to access healthcare data between EHRs. FHIR is the means of achieving this.
As the lights dim and you begin crunching on some buttery popcorn, the theater is illuminated by a forest green screen. After the first trailer ends, the screen changes to a dark red. The words on the screen say that it’s been approved for a restricted audience only.
When it comes to movie trailers, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) created a set of standards that help determine whether a film is deemed appropriate for every viewer.
In the same way that the MPAA has used their rating system to try and make the film industry better, so have Standard Development Organizations (SDOs) created health data standards to improve interoperability between healthcare organizations and their Electronic Health Record (EHR) system.
Modern healthcare generates seemingly endless amounts of data, from Progress Notes, exams, and lab tests, to emergency room visits, hospital stays, health trackers, and more. By next year, according to an estimate from Stanford Medicine’s Health Trends Report, the U.S. will have more than 2,314 exabytes (an exabyte is a trillion megabytes) of data.
The more relevant point, author Michael E. Thompson notes, is that healthcare today is “awash in data, yet barely ankle deep in information.”
What if you were the new coach of the team with the worst record in the NFL? How would you improve the organization’s performance? One approach might be to benchmark what’s working for the best teams in the league and use available assets to adapt your processes to what makes those other teams a success.
In healthcare, too, benchmarking can be a critical component in improving efficiency, quality of care, patient safety, and patient satisfaction.
Many medical organizations talk about having a roadmap to the future, but following one is hard. Adopting new healthcare IT can feel overwhelming when you’re trying to keep up with your daily patients.
But overwhelming becomes manageable when a practice remembers the principles that go into a good roadmap.
In spring 2012, at a time when Electronic Health Records (EHRs) were still far from universal, the journal Perspectives in Health Information Management published a study examining how EHRs can impact practice workflows.
Consider the following paragraph:
11-5-5-16-9-14-7 16-1-20-9-5-14-20-19 5-14-7-1-7-5-4 1-14-4 3-15-13-9-14-7 2-1-3-11 20-15 25-15-21-18 16-18-1-3-20-9-3-5 3-15-21-12-4 3-15-13-5 4-15-23-14 20-15 19-15-13-5-20-8-9-14-7 1-19 19-9-13-16-12-5 1-19 7-15-15-4 3-15-13-13-21-14-9-3-1-20-9-15-14. 23-8-5-14-5-22-5-18 20-8-5-18-5’19 1 16-18-15-2-12-5-13, 11-14-15-23-9-14-7 1-14-4 21-14-4-5-18-19-20-1-14-4-9-14-7 20-8-1-20 20-8-5-18-5 9-19 1 19-5-20 15-6 20-15-15-12-19 20-8-1-20 3-15-21-12-4 19-15-12-22-5 20-8-5 16-18-15-2-12-5-13 3-15-21-12-4 13-1-11-5 25-15-21-18 12-9-6-5 5-1-19-9-5-18 1-14-4 11-5-5-16 25-15-21-18 16-18-1-3-20-9-3-5 1-6-12-15-1-20.
Does the paragraph make sense to you?
Here’s a familiar script: Your practice delivers quality care. You attract more patients, perhaps more than you can easily handle. You’d love to call a timeout to decide how to better serve the patients you’ll be seeing tomorrow, but you’re just too busy serving the patients you’re seeing today.
While every medical practice has distinctive characteristics — from its providers and location to the way it approaches daily workflows — the medical challenges that practices face do not vary all that much from place to place.
Every practice can benefit by emphasizing preventive care. And every practice can use some help in implementing IT solutions to reach at-risk patients.
Compass Medical, a 25-year-old primary care organization & an Accountable Care Organization in Southeastern Massachusetts, recognized that their 80,000-patient population faced the same problems seen anywhere else in the U.S. That’s why, following their March 2015 Go-Live with eClinicalWorks, Compass Medical took aim at one of the most widespread killers of all — lung cancer.
“We are a family-care driven organization focused on prevention and health management," said Dr. Dhrumil Shah, Chief Medical Information Officer.
Thank you for attending the 2019 National Conference with us in Orlando. We hope that you learned a lot, attended every session that interested you, and had fun. Let’s take a look back at some highlights over the last few days.
Where did the great music go? What happened to those illuminated palm trees? Who silenced the silent disco? By dawn on Sunday morning, all trace of Saturday night’s amazing celebration was gone. Just a few thin hours stood between the final memorable chords from the sound stage and the serious business of Day 3 at the 2019 eClinicalWorks and healow National Conference.
In the lobby of the Orlando World Center Marriott, the rhythmic patter of torrential rain washed across the glass ceiling in waves as thousands gathered for the second day of the eClinicalWorks and healow National Conference.
We live in a digitized, globalized world driven by phones, apps, email, and who-knows-what technologies to come. Yet, as over 5,000 people gather in Orlando for Friday’s opening of the 2019 eClinicalWorks and healow National Conference, every one of us is excited to meet old friends, share our experiences, and make new connections — in person.
Why? Because #eCWNC19 is about making the personal connections that can be hard to forge in our fast-paced world.