WHAT MAKES A GOOD ORTHOPEDIC EMR?

Introduction

Orthopedic EMR has become the most used technique these days. All the specialists of certain fields use EMR these days and it is a mobile-friendly process in which you digitally add the whole data of a patient with much ease as compared to the manual paperwork. In this system, proper templates are given in which there are different categories and physicists just add the data and it is saved.

This process is very efficacious for orthopedics as they have extensive data of each patient and different procedures, exercises, and medication.

Who is an Orthopedist?

These are the specialists who deal with fractures, deformities, arthritis, bone injuries, and sports injuries, etc. if the patients have a problem with bones or joints they consult an orthopedic specialist.

What is EMR?

The term EMR stands for ‘Electronic Medical Record’. EMRs are the alternative for the manual recording of patient’s data on the paper charts by the physicists with enhanced patient care features.

The term EMR also known as EHR (Electronic Health Record), these two terms are used simultaneously but there are a few differences between them. The EMR allows the practitioner to collect health information about their patients electronically. It is a record in digital format that may be shared across different healthcare settings through network-connected information systems, such records may include the whole range of data in comprehensive or summary form including but not limited to

• Demographics

• Medical history

• Medication and allergies

• Immunization status

• Laboratory test results

• Radiology images

• Vital signs

• Personal stats – age and weight

• Billing information

There are a variety of important reasons for physicians and facilities to make the move from paper medical records to complete certified EMR solutions. A successful EMR or EHR if implemented correctly can improve the quality of patient care increased productivity and expand revenue.

EHR, Practice Management, Billing Solution, Patient Portal and Self Check-In Kiosk. 

User friendly, and very easy to use. Now you can focus more on patient care.

Specialty Specific EHR. No hidden fees or surprises. 

Tailored to Your Orthopedic Practice

Orthopedic EHR/EMR: 

Orthopedic EMR is customizable medical software that is used by orthopedic specialists that enhances the certain workflow, provides related templates to this field, ensures easy documentation for the proper evaluation of the patients, records the process of medication, and also the pre-assembled SOAP notes templates. 

How does the orthopedic EMR benefit patient care? 

There are numerous benefits of this customized software in the field of orthopedics as it eases the process of management in every possible way 

• Improves overall chart quality

• Reduces medical errors

• Consolidates patient histories

• Electronically generates and transmits prescriptions

• Improves description decisions

• Facilitates more correct diagnosis

• Generates patient reminders for preventive and follow-up care

• Encourages patient health maintenance

• Enhances communication with the patients 

How does Orthopedic EMR improve productivity? 

Orthopedic EMR is a better way and the previous process of managing data on paper charts was very daunting and basic and it was just not very user-friendly at all. Built-in orthopedic knowledge improves productivity like it knows what a physicist needs, it is vital to have the basic foundation there otherwise you will not be efficient or productive. 

Orthopedic specialists observe a lot of work comp, a lot of personal injuries and their notes have to be very detailed because they are deposed on them a lot so it helps to have those details in there and have the ability to also type extra if you need to or to dictate into that. The orthopedic specialists cannot imagine working with non-ortho EMR. 

So overall this system improves the productivity of the professionals as 

• Permits multiple users and location access to patient charts

• Saves time in locating, filing, and copying requested medical records

• Reduces paperwork and duplicates writing

• Prompts electronic billing and allows for easier invoicing and payment 

How orthopedic EMR increases revenues? 

Where this system provides ease for the specialists it also is cost-friendly and increases the revenues in the best possible ways 

• Limits lost revenue with more accurate coding

• Eliminates record storage and transcript costs

• Reduces the cost of paper chart materials

• Increases services with health maintenance reminders

• Improves specialist productivity which could translate into additional patients seen per day

• Controls patient care costs by reducing redundancy of clinical services

• Saves office space for chart storage which may translate into added billable space

• Opens up insurance, tax, and government incentive opportunities 

Selection of an orthopedic EMR 

Orthopedic practices cover a large scale of data of the patients and it is a strenuous job to be done to collect the data of each patient and record it so the choice of an EMR must be very wise and selective that covers all the dimensions of the respective work of the orthopedic practitioners. Due to the demanding nature of this field, the practitioners require a lot of options and it has also been observed that orthopedic specialists have more freedom than other specialists as there is a variety of EMR/EHR in the market and also they don’t need to alter the existing present system but choose the one from abundance according to their needs and wants. 

Which features must be implanted in an orthopedic EHR/EMR? 

As it is already mentioned that the data entry task for orthopedic specialists is very irksome so having the best EMR that meets your requirements is an ineluctable thing. Always select an EMR from many that have the capability of managing the influx of the patients’ data and also manages the risks related to any medicine. 

So there must be these inbuilt features/highlights regarding software, pricing of an orthopedic EMR: 

• Amenable work-flow and documentation: orthopedic is a very vast area where the practitioners do not witness the same kind of possibilities so with every patient the circumstances differ as the orthopedic practice deals with different kinds of fractures, deformities, sports injuries, and personal injury so the data varies every time. So, an orthopedic EMR must support flexibility in the data entry process and provide multiple templates to regulate the workflow of the practitioners. 

Feature of the customizable template must also be there to enhance the flexibility of the system and that can be adjusted according to the different procedures such as spinal cord stimulation, trigger point injections, and peripheral or selective nerve blocks. Procedure and surgery customizable template systems are also available. 

• Medical care management: when a patient consults a practitioner, there are obvious chances that he is under the consultation of other specialists too so it is kind of a collaborative process in nature so in this regard the specialists must be able to share data and record patient’s treatment plans to ensure the proper medical care across numerous care systems.

• Instinctual design: if we talk about the patient volume then the orthopedic field is famous for it. They have to deal with the patients in abundance. So the orthopedic EMR must be designed accordingly to ensure an efficacious workflow. It must also entertain the feature of the management of patient scheduling and other treatment areas. The practitioners have to keep in mind the accommodation of the high volume of patients along with maintaining the quality of care. So the features of the orthopedic EMR must consolidate all these requirements.

• Electronic prescription of the controlled drug: controlled substances/drugs are those medicines whose processing is regulated by the government. So most of the time orthopedic practitioners prescribe their patients addictive painkillers for either acute or chronic pain and the patients also seek refuge from such practitioners to comply with their addiction. So it is the responsibility of the practitioners to monitor the patients’ history and if they are involved in any substance abuse to observe the drug regulating laws of the state. 

So in this way, an effective e-prescribing system with the viability for the safe usage of government-regulated substances can be observed. 

• Writing and voice conceding technology: if this amazing technology is implanted in the features of orthopedic EMR then it will allow the efficiency of the system to enhance and support proficiency and ease.

• Terrific implementation: the perfect orthopedic EMR must have the ability the provision sensational implementation support. Efficacious implementation includes overarching analysis of procedures and processes to avoid any kind of nuisance. For every practice, there needs a specialist for the implementation who will act systematically throughout the implementation process.

• Complaisant and purposeful use: the EMR software must be in coherence with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) and act responsibly. The system which has inbuilt compliance in it will save the time of the specialists and thus enable them to focus more on the patients. 

The following features that orthopedic software must adhere to are: 

• Upgrades patient affiance

• Permits patient care harmonization

• Reinforces health data exchange

• Rationalizes workflow

• Prime quality coaching: inclusive EMR training/coaching to the practitioners is indispensable to success. It will allow the specialists to learn in the broader aspect of all the dimensions of the area. 

This proactive approach will help the practitioners in the long run like it will make sure the patient safety as they will already know where the data is placed etc and it will also enhance the processing of the system. Successful EMR system training incorporates certain exercises as in the provision of an in-house trainer and customized in his specialty because every person has different learning ways so it will depend on the person’s capabilities that what training should be provided. 

• Facilitated data provision: the best thing about this EMR system is that it unloads your burden of collecting and managing the data. And the orthopedic EMR allows you to input data even at the comfort of your home. 

The data can be about compliance with the patient, billing process, or the workflow that is needed. This system helps the practitioners in every possible way for example in tracking patients, monitoring patient activities and exercises, and managing the quality of medical care.

• Safety of the patient’s data and its easy sharing: in this manner, there are two concerns of the orthopedic practitioners

• First, safe and guaranteed sharing of the patient’s data with other specialists

• Secondly, there is left no loophole while sharing the data that anyone could access.

• And the reasonable orthopedic EMR/EHR should have these qualities to gain the attention of the practitioners because at some points they need to share certain data with other providers so to make them at ease it is necessary to ensure that the patients are having good care and also void any nuisance while sharing data with other specialists. 

• The satisfaction of the patients: to satisfy a patient is the prime objective of any practitioner and if the specialist is all time busy in writing data on the papers how will he diagnose the patient properly and all the process of the treatment will get disturbed as there is an outflow of the patients to orthopedic practitioners so in minimum time the best has to be provided to the patients. 

To avoid all this fuss EMR system is the best escape that helps the patients to have online booking according to their suitable time via the patient portal and also gives reminders to the patients to remember when they will consult their certain provider. There is also a concept of “TELEMEDICINE” that is useful when there is a minor issue and no need to see the physician directly and this system is very patient-friendly as they don’t need to travel. According to this system, the patient and the doctor interact with each other such as 

• Discussion about the diagnose

• Description of the test results

• What are the symptoms

• Gives prescription

• Treatment processing 

It is the most viable system these days that bring the EMR system in the limelight and also protects the patients from different diseases that they might catch if they visit the hospital.

So these are the main features and highlights regarding the orthopedic EMR software that must be inherent in the system and an orthopedic specialist must look forward to these requirements while selecting the software because all these features help in making the best orthopedic EMR. 

Cost for the orthopedic EMR

The price or cost of the orthopedic EMR/EHR varies with the features implanted in the software. If the software is providing the best and required features to the practitioner then it will cost a lot more than the other. 

The fee fluctuates from the vendor to vendor and here are a few examples of pricing from the vendors from whom the physicians buy the orthopedic EMR in the market. 

Specific EMRs must be in an orthopedist’s list 

The orthopedists have more freedom than other specialists because of the versatility of their field and they have to deal with large masses of people with different injuries. So they look for the EMR that is most suitable for their procedures and practice. 

These are a few of the best in the race of orthopedic EMR systems that meet the needs of the practitioners and make them at ease. All of them allow the providers to have customizable templates according to their wants, stimulated workflow, and flexibility in the management, billing portal, patient portal, and the facility of benchmarking and quality measurement. 

Conclusion 

The orthopedic practice can be varied with the specialty of the providers in the given spectrum, thus the orthopedic EMR must entertain the providers with the functionality of multi-specialty EMR due to the unique requirements of the orthopedists. 

There is also another improved and cool system has been introduced that is called orthopedic –specific EHR that kind of eliminates the need of the multi-specialty orthopedic EMR as it provides the specific tools within the software to enhance the orthopedist’s performance and way of working as they barely do work in the hospitals but work in an independent environment so they are free to select a system that is viable in every possible way. 

In short orthopedic EMR is the best alternative to manual paperwork that is much tiresome and time taking as it does not let the orthopedists focus more on the actual problems of the patients while diagnosing. After all this, the provider also keeps in mind that they have to choose the one software that is all in one or that specific one with different tools as their field demands more flexible and benchmarking software to manage the workflow and all these qualities collectively make a good orthopedic EMR. 

Sources 

https://www.healthit.gov/buzz-blog/electronic-health-and-medical-records/emr-vs-ehr-difference 

https://www.cms.gov/Regulations-and-Guidance/Legislation/EHRIncentivePrograms/Certification  

Related Articles:

Orthopedic Billing Guide

Please click here for a complete guide to the most common orthopedic procedure codes

ICD-10 Clinical Concepts for Orthopedics

Orthopedic EMR