Practice Excellence in Two Clicks of a Mouse

Optometric Management, Dec 2004 by Morris, Scot

What do I do with the paper?

So you've decided to go electronic, but what do you do with old and new records?

* The old records. Take one of the following two actions:

1. Scan all existing medical record documents into your EPMS program. (This uses a great deal of storage capacity for information that you may never use.) Many EPMS vendors will have the ability to write a program to convert paper fields into the software program. Get a clear written explanation of the services that it will complete. Plan on this process taking as long as six months.

2. Scan or import (manually or digitally) any pertinent information in an existing file when the patient comes in. Doing so prevents excessive and unnecessary scanning for inactive patients. Important: Archive all paper files for at least seven years to meet legal requirements. Plan on it taking three to five years to complete the total conversion.

* The new paper. The question that comes up post-conversion is, "What about the paper forms that you receive from outside sources such as referral letters, surgical reports or other diagnostics tests?" Scan them into your electronic files.

Your IT consultant can even discuss how to receive all of your faxes electronically and save scanning time. Why allow a "behind-the-times practice" to keep you one step behind?

The next step

As technology progresses, pen-based and voice recognition input will alter the doctor-patient encounter by increasing both eye contact and communication that's typically limited with paper charts. We'll be more productive, more efficient and give better quality patient service.

There have been estimates that 50% of medical facilities will have an EPMS by the end of 2006. An EPMS won't make your practice immediately more profitable, but it will continuously increase your profitability one patient at a time.

BY SCOT MORRIS, O.D., F.A.A.O.

Conifer, Colo.

Dr. Morris is the director of Eye Consultants of Colorado, LLC, as well as Morris Education & Consulting Associates. He is a member of the American Optometric Association and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Optometry. You can reach him at scbmorris@earthlink.net or (302) 250-0376.