BEI HIT Blog
EMR & HIPAA
Most providers think their productivity will go down if they implement an EHR. Trouble is that most providers don’t really measure productivity and don’t think about how to improve it. Using an EMR is a great way to start because the measurement tools are available. If these tools are used properly, productivity measurement and improvement can be attained.
The most recent EMR adoption numbers I’ve seen are putting EMR adoption at about 60% of doctors. When I think about the other 40% of doctors that have yet to adopt an EMR, my guess is that the biggest reason they haven’t adopted an EMR is based on their fear that an EMR will negatively impact their practice and their productivity. They fear that a change to EMR is going to be negative rather than a positive that it could be.
A whitepaper called Getting Lean with Your Practice: Five Tips for Improving Provider Productivity with an EHR does a good job looking at the issues of productivity in a practice and how to improve that productivity. One thing it points out is that if you can’t measure it, then you don’t really know how you’re doing. Turns out, an EMR is a great way to measure productivity. Read More
EMR & HIPAA
BEI Commentary: The jury is out on email versus text, but it is important to think about what communications method is best to interact with patients. While we are not there from a HIPAA compliance standpoint, it is helpful to think about this now.
The idea of improving communication in healthcare is always a hot one. For fear of HIPAA and other factors, healthcare seems to lag behind when adopting the latest communication technologies. The most simple examples are email and text message. Both are simple and widely adopted communication technologies and most in healthcare are afraid to use them.
At the core of why people are afraid is because native email is not HIPAA secure and native SMS is not HIPAA secure either. Although, there are a whole suite of communication products that are working to solve the healthcare communication security challenges while still keeping the simplicity of an email or text message. In fact, both of the other companies I’ve started or advise, Physia and docBeat, are focused on the problems of secure email and secure text. Plus, there are dozens of other companies working to improve healthcare communication and hundreds of EMR, PHR, and HIE applications that are integrating these forms of communication into their systems. Read More
From: EMR and HIPAA, June 6, 2011
BEI Commentary: A confusing issue faced by many practices today is understanding and dealing with both the HITECH (meaningful use) program, and ERx (eprescribing/MIPPA). The rules should be “harmonized” as there is really no need for separate programs. This issue is being addressed with a proposed rule that was published in the Federal Register on June 1.
Some physicians—most notably, surgeons and pain-management specialists—have expressed concern that they will be unfairly subject to the 2012 ePrescribing penalties, based on the fact that their opportunities to ePrescribe are limited by the nature of their practices. The Proposed ePrescribing Rule published in the Federal Register on June 1 offers a potential remedy for these providers.
The rule, which amends the (MIPPA) 2011 ePrescribing rule, affords providers several new arguments they can use to request a “hardship exemption” from the 2012 penalties. (These are in addition to the already existing reasons, i.e., rural areas that lack high speed internet access and/or rural areas that lack pharmacies that accept ePrescriptions.) The new justifications include:
1) Inability to ePrescribe due to local, State, or Federal law, (i.e., providers who predominantly prescribe controlled substances).
2) Inability to count the ePrescriptions towards the Medicare incentive program, (i.e., providers who predominantly prescribe post-surgery—visits that are not included in the specified CPT denominator codes. Read More
