MDNews - Greater Boston

M D N E W S .C O M /// M D N E W S N O R T H O F B O S T O N ■ 2 017 0 5 IN T H E D I G I TA L a ge we live in, we obsess over speed of information. In hea lth care, it can save lives. In business, it ca n save money. But how good a re our options with rega rd to synchronizing EMR systems with billing companies? If a system is fundamentally flawed, can the speed of information cost lives and lose money? In recent years, we have seen certain large hospital systems address the issue of EMR/billing synchronization with varying results. Some of the more painful conversions have taken up to five anxiety-ridden years to complete! Even conversions that were ultimately successful were often fraught with aggravation and frustration in the beginning. Now we are seeing smaller systems, and even single provider clinics, ma king the switch with predictably similar results. Here a re some a rea s to focus on if you a re ready to ma ke the switch: 1. CONSIDER CHANGING YOUR EMR TO MATCH YOUR BILLING COMPANY. It is worth ta king a demonstration and ana lyzing a lmost any system for easy linkage. Don't be tempted to just ta ke the advice of your billing company. Their PM system is typica lly very di•erent from the EMR . That said, many billing and EMR companies have identified your struggle and are creating partnerships to cut down costs and create simple bridges to one another. For instance, a billing company may have a preferred surgica l EMR vendor and a preferred PCP vendor. One-time fees in the area of $300–900 will connect the two systems for the client and a llow a ll work to stream directly through. There is no ongoing maintenance fee required. Some billing companies have a free and open A PI, which gives them the bandwidth to connect with nearly any EMR on the market. If you have a good IT vendor, this will give you a lot of options. It 's a lso a good idea to consider renegotiating your billing fees, as you'll be ma king their process less laborious. 2. COMMUNICATION AND TRUST ARE KEY CONSIDERATIONS. Get references from your IT vendor and follow up with clients they have who you know and, more importantly, who will tell you the truth. It is no secret that software developers and medical experts often struggle to get on the same page. Focus on relative computer languages: HL7 to HL7 or API to API. 3. ASK THE FOLLOWING QUESTIONS OF YOUR VENDORS THROUGHOUT THE PROCESS: + Specifica lly, which direction does the information flow? From the EMR to the billing company only? You may need the billing company data (such as payments) to feed back to your EMR as well. + Does the EMR insurance information overwrite the billing company data? If the data in your o-ce is not maintained as well as the billing company's, this will lead to rejections. + What happens if your providers do not send some of their encounters to the billing company? There must be a fail-safe to a lert you and the provider when an encounter has not been submitted for 48 hours. Many systems will prevent providers from submitting their current billing if they have past billing incomplete. The key is to have the foresight to fix problems before they happen. The reason smaller practices are able to navigate this process is because they have discussed the catastrophes their peers have experienced. If you follow the guidance above, your own conversion should be far less fraught. Timothy D i Bona is the B u s iness D irector at D octors' Management Service Inc. and the President of Salus Resource Group. He has collaborated with hundreds of physicians over the past 25 years. He believes in trust-first relationships fueled with consistent communication. He can be reached at Tim@ DoctorsManagementService.org. ■ Keys to Successfully Synchronizing Your EMR and Billing Software BY TIMOTHY DIBONA GETTING IN SYNC: I T U P D A T E ❰❰❰❰❰ 0 5

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