One thing that all psychiatry practices can agree on is the need for new administrative practices that emphasize speed, efficiency and accuracy. Unfortunately, these goals may be somewhat out of reach for psychiatrists who continue to abide by the old standards of filing, note-taking and record-keeping.
If you are still keeping paper records, just think how much office space is consumed by the filing cabinets needed to store those charts. In addition, training new office staff on how to find a particular record or patient file can be complex. Ever try to locate a lost or misplaced chart? These days people expect a level of ease and accessibility to records that paper filing methods are unable to provide. Switching to electronic records can save your psychiatry practice time and precious space.
So how can psychiatrists make their practices more efficient while simultaneously providing their patients with a higher standard of care? Electronic medical records (EMRs) and electronic health records (EHRs) are the latest wave in integrated technology for psychiatric professionals -- allowing them to streamline and enhance a number of daily operations in their practices. Here are a few of the benefits that psychiatry EMRs and EHRs provide.
Scheduling and tracking appointments
Once a relationship begins between a care provider and a patient, it's often one that lasts for a long time. A clinician may start seeing someone who is dealing with a specific condition or problem, and based on the effectiveness of his or her treatment and expertise, that initial connection could grow into a long-term trust. This may be particularly true for psychiatrists.
Unfortunately, a behavioral health professional frequently treats many patients, with varying lengths of time between each patient's next appointment. This can make keeping track of those patients challenging for both the psychiatrist and his or her staff. Fortunately, EMRs and EHRs can make this challenge more manageable. Patients can schedule their own appointments online, and the EMR can link these appointments to the patient's mental health chart automatically, making front office processes much more efficient.
This means that mental health professionals are able to navigate through all of their patients' appointments while also brushing up on relevant notes and data well in advance. The technology also allows for more direct communication between visits.
Becoming paperless
Many people would be surprised how inefficient and costly relying on paper documents can be for psychiatry practices. For starters, the initial cost of purchasing journals, files, printer paper, envelopes and notes can really begin to add up over time, particularly for organizations that see a large number of patients on a regular basis. Additionally, maintaining these physical records can be incredibly expensive. Behavioral Healthcare reports that practices lose about $8 per record every year in tracking, filing, auditing and supervising expenses, and that's not to mention the extra space needed to store these documents.
Something more significant even than these losses is time spent by psychiatrists updating paper charts. On average, a psychiatrist spends 30 minutes a day managing paper records. While this might not seem like a major investment, a practice with 40 providers loses nearly $208,000 per year because of paper records, according to the source. Converting to electronic records can mean real savings in both time and money for a psychiatric practice.
Increased patient flow
The upside of working more efficiently and reducing the resource drain of paper records is that psychiatrists spend more time on patient care. According to EHR Institute, clinicians using EMRs are able to create notes with a higher level of detail and accuracy in less time, which can lead to delivering a higher quality of care. The end result is fewer factual errors and a reduced need to double-check medical histories which can slow therapeutic progress.
Not only does this benefit patients in getting the treatment they need to improve their mental or behavioral condition, but it also increases the flow of business for practitioners. Psychiatrists and support staff members can spend more time working with a greater number of patients thanks to EMRs, which leads to more revenue. In fact, greater accuracy in coding and billing can increase billable gains by $26 per patient visit, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. And additional revenue is something that all mental health professionals can get behind.
If you are still keeping paper records, just think how much office space is consumed by the filing cabinets needed to store those charts. In addition, training new office staff on how to find a particular record or patient file can be complex. Ever try to locate a lost or misplaced chart? These days people expect a level of ease and accessibility to records that paper filing methods are unable to provide. Switching to electronic records can save your psychiatry practice time and precious space.
So how can psychiatrists make their practices more efficient while simultaneously providing their patients with a higher standard of care? Electronic medical records (EMRs) and electronic health records (EHRs) are the latest wave in integrated technology for psychiatric professionals -- allowing them to streamline and enhance a number of daily operations in their practices. Here are a few of the benefits that psychiatry EMRs and EHRs provide.
Scheduling and tracking appointments
Once a relationship begins between a care provider and a patient, it's often one that lasts for a long time. A clinician may start seeing someone who is dealing with a specific condition or problem, and based on the effectiveness of his or her treatment and expertise, that initial connection could grow into a long-term trust. This may be particularly true for psychiatrists.
Unfortunately, a behavioral health professional frequently treats many patients, with varying lengths of time between each patient's next appointment. This can make keeping track of those patients challenging for both the psychiatrist and his or her staff. Fortunately, EMRs and EHRs can make this challenge more manageable. Patients can schedule their own appointments online, and the EMR can link these appointments to the patient's mental health chart automatically, making front office processes much more efficient.
This means that mental health professionals are able to navigate through all of their patients' appointments while also brushing up on relevant notes and data well in advance. The technology also allows for more direct communication between visits.
Becoming paperless
Many people would be surprised how inefficient and costly relying on paper documents can be for psychiatry practices. For starters, the initial cost of purchasing journals, files, printer paper, envelopes and notes can really begin to add up over time, particularly for organizations that see a large number of patients on a regular basis. Additionally, maintaining these physical records can be incredibly expensive. Behavioral Healthcare reports that practices lose about $8 per record every year in tracking, filing, auditing and supervising expenses, and that's not to mention the extra space needed to store these documents.
Something more significant even than these losses is time spent by psychiatrists updating paper charts. On average, a psychiatrist spends 30 minutes a day managing paper records. While this might not seem like a major investment, a practice with 40 providers loses nearly $208,000 per year because of paper records, according to the source. Converting to electronic records can mean real savings in both time and money for a psychiatric practice.
Increased patient flow
The upside of working more efficiently and reducing the resource drain of paper records is that psychiatrists spend more time on patient care. According to EHR Institute, clinicians using EMRs are able to create notes with a higher level of detail and accuracy in less time, which can lead to delivering a higher quality of care. The end result is fewer factual errors and a reduced need to double-check medical histories which can slow therapeutic progress.
Not only does this benefit patients in getting the treatment they need to improve their mental or behavioral condition, but it also increases the flow of business for practitioners. Psychiatrists and support staff members can spend more time working with a greater number of patients thanks to EMRs, which leads to more revenue. In fact, greater accuracy in coding and billing can increase billable gains by $26 per patient visit, according to the American Academy of Family Physicians. And additional revenue is something that all mental health professionals can get behind.
About the Author:
ICANotes has been making mental health practices more efficient for more than 14 years. Discover how you can create narrative psychiatric progress notes in two minutes with no typing or dictating. Take a free test drive of our mental health EMR today.
No comments:
Post a Comment