Practice Partner Demo by Local Physicians

EMR Event held in Scottsdale Arizona 2009

Event held at Scottsdale Medical Center, AZ for affiliated physicians interested in switching to an electronic medical record. The hospital has chosen to partner with McKesson and AZCOMP offering their EMR solutions- Medisoft Clinical, Lytec MD, and Practice Partner- at an exclusive negotiated discount rate. AZCOMP is the local reseller chosen by the hospital to install, train, and support the software for the physicians.

The special guest speakers at the event were Jaron Fischbeck, MD and Janet Mullins, MD. - two local physicians who have been using the Electronic Medical Record since 2007. These physicians use Total Practice Partner, but all the EMR features they show are applicable to Medisoft Clinical and Lytec MD. (The EMR is the same in each software- the difference is the patient accounting software.) 

For viewing convenience the videos have been broken down into smaller segments. Feel free to start at the top and work your way down to view the entire event, or pick and choose which topics most interest you and jump around. 
 

• Why transition to an Electronic Medical Record?

  Dr. Mullins shares several reasons why she chose to get rid of paper charts- Efficiency, Quality Care, Reporting, Save Paper. She also shares how she decided on Practice Partner among so many options. Dr Mullins gives a brief overview of why she was attracted to this software.

• Going from paper charts to a paperless practice

  Dr Mullins shares what had to change from the paper to electronic world. She also shows the timeline for implementing the software. Dr Fischbeck introduces himself and shares his experiences of two different transitions from paper charts to electronic. He compares the implementation of nextgen during his residency to implementing practice partner at Kachina Family Practice.

• Getting rid of Paper Charts
  

  Most physicians have thousands of charts that they can't even fit in their office and rent space just to store the charts. When switching to an EMR the big decision has to be made- how do we get rid of our paper charts. Who scans them? How long will it take to scan all the paper charts and put them on our server? How much will it cost? Should I outsource the scanning or do it ourself? Dr. Fischbeck shares what they decided to do and gives some reasons as wll as pros and cons for the various options.

• Communication with Patients
  

  Messaging patients with quick texts is easy and efficient. Dr Mullins shares common messages that they have templates for: Reviewing lab results, instructions so the patient can get prior authorization themself, and many more. They also made a message for "no more refills until they come in again". Which has a "Harsh" or "Soft" message option. Patients appreciate the ease of the messages. Orders are quickly done in the software by the physician while they are with the patient. They pop up on the medical assistants dashboard and by the time they are done meeting with the physican their orders are ready and they don't have to wait around. 

• Intra Office Communication
  

  The entire practice had to learn to communicate with eachother in a whole new way. No more excuses- "I didn't get the memo" or "I didn't look at the white board".

• Using Templates for documentation
  

  Dr Fischbeck shares what was important and why they chose to use templates to document: Most important was providing quality care, second was documenting rapidly and accurately. Now documentation is done real time with the patient in the room. I can leave at the end of the day and I am done. I can spend more time with my family than with my charts. Now we can get paid for everything we do because of our documentation.

• Documenting Real Time

  Dr Fischbeck feels that the EMR actually enhances the rapoire and relationship with the patients instead of inhibiting it like he imagined. He can pull up reports and view them right there with the patients. He reviews the template features. Past medical history is automatically pulled into the note. The templates gives you a lot of flexibility in your documentation. He used to have to use his big ICD9 code book, but now the codes are readily available which saves a lot of time. The templates are so quickly customizable. How much are you actually pointing the stylus verses typing? Dr Fischbeck explains how and why he personally is a hybrid of both.

• Diabetic Template Demo

  When the note is opened the physician can easily see the last date the Pneumovax was done or the last BMP. Physcians can provide better care. If you don't touch on one of the lines in the template then it simply won't appear on the final note. You don't have to answer every question- but they are there if you need them. All of this will send orders and populate where needed over the chart. He can now do a good quality care appointment with a diabetic in 10 minutes compared to before it would take about 25 minutes and it wasn't as good of quality care.

• How to change medication

  If a patient is no longer using a medication you can easily document when it was stopped and why. This is especially helpful down the road to know why a medication was stopped.
  

• Lab Results automatically pulled into the chart

  Sonoran quest (or any other lab with a bridge to the EMR) will put all those lab results in the lab review bin- once they are reviewed and signed off the lab is automatically put into the correct place in the patient's chart. It does it all for you.
  

• Bright Note Technology Does it for you

  The physician only has to do it once- you don't enter it into multiple places in the chart. It automatically pushes and pulls information for you. They wanted to use templates because the wanted it to automatically pull in the last exam when a note was opened. It will pull in all the health maintenance data for you.
  

• Options for using multiple templates on the same visit
  

  You can insert a template directly into another template. Dr Mullins prefers to do this for all her "oh, by the way" things that pop up in an appointment.

• Practice Partner Template Reminds of steps for less common visits

  Dr Fischbeck likes that the templates can help guide and remind him of questions during those less common visits. These quick reminders improve the quality of care given to the physician.

• Letter Templates in Practice Partner

  Dr Fischbeck loves using letter templates. It is no longer bothersome when patients need a note. The nurse can even do it since the signature is already saved on the letterhead. Now he does these letters in 10 seconds which saves him lots of time. He loves it and so do the patients. They even have a letter template for when their patients go to a consultant or specialist. Practice Partner is a very powerful program which makes you life so much easier.

To find out more about implementing an Electronic Medical Record contact us at 888.358.2667.