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Planning for ICD-10 – Part Two
Tuesday, January 24th, 2012| THE STEPS TO ICD-10
In our last installment, we discussed the merits of using dbtech tools to mitigate ICD-10 report discovery. Here, we will go deeper into the project plan to analyze the benefits of chart analysis, financial contingency planning, and forms inventory. |
Signature Capture with Interactive eForms
Thursday, January 19th, 2012THE PAPERLESS OFFICE
While detractors have derailed the idea as impossible, dbtech has always chased the promise of the paperless office. We believe this progression is not only possible, but that it can be achieved by eliminating paper with technology and workflow redesigns that fit patient expectations.
Dbtech’s newest enhancements, eForms Interactive Forms and Signature Capture provide significant steps towards creating a paperless office, eliminating the expenses and inefficiencies of paper forms, while expanding your options for collecting structured data.
Until now, paper-based waivers and releases were signed by patients at registration. These forms come from a desk drawer or are printed on-demand through the eForms module. Either way, the patient still picks up a pen, signs a document, then returns it to the registrar for scanning into a document imaging platform (hopefully Rasi!).
Today, many hospitals are moving from this workflow towards ones that eliminate paper and provide an experience patients are well familiar with in other industries. Whether at the pharmacy, a local bank or a favorite automobile repair shop, consumers have grown accustomed to signing documents electronically. Many now even perceive ink-to-paper signatures as antiquated – and a sign of a technologically-stunted business.
USING INTERACTIVE eForms
When you pair a Topaz signature device with Interactive eForms and Signature Capture software, ink or wet signatures are eliminated, paper is removed and processes move smoothly.
And, the benefits do not end at registration. Throughout your facility, Interactive Forms eliminates inefficient paper forms while allowing you to leverage form data in new ways. For instance, many hospitals routinely utilize Case Managers and Financial Councilors to assist patients with financial aid through charity care programs. These programs often require multiple forms with data existing nowhere else in their information systems. With Interactive eForms, these paper forms are eliminated, inputs are validated, and form data is repurposed in XML format.
INTERACTIVE eForms & THE HOME HEALTH WORKER
When we began designing Interactive eForms, the initial goal was to address a home health workers’ need to collect data while in the field – specifically at the patient’s home. Using Rasi and eForms, we developed a workflow where interactive patient forms are emailed to homecare nurses. The nurse simply opens and completes forms at the patient’s home. Once the nurse reconnects to the internet, the form, and its data, is transmitted. This workflow modification saves days of work by eliminating the process of printing, writing and faxing forms between central offices and the homecare nurse.
Throughout the process, our development team focused on creating an interactive forms environment where data would be actionable, validated and used by any user without incremental cost. The forms had to be easy to create using a toolkit with which many IT analysts were already familiar. Thus, we selected Adobe Acrobat and PDF (the most widely-accepted and platform-agnostic file type in the healthcare industry) for creating and delivering forms.
Ask us about Interactive eForms and Signature Capture to start creating your paperless office today!
Planning for ICD-10 – Part One
Friday, January 13th, 2012By now you’re likely wrapping up 5010 efforts and well into designing a project plan for ICD-10.
In this two-part post, we’ll illustrate how dbtech Ras is addressing these industry events to help you have a profitable and worry-free 2012. read more…
Working With Existing Platforms … The Ras API
Tuesday, December 13th, 2011| SIMPLICITY Dbtech has always given our customers the tools needed to simplify burdensome workflows and save time and money. This has been our goal since the early 90’s when we initially developed Ras to help customers reduce paper expenses and manual distribution methods. Ras has changed significantly from those early days, but our core principles have never changed; easy-to-use solutions that are simple to manage and present information to users in the best possible way. Administrative simplification and intuitive user interfaces have led dbtech to develop the Ras API. |
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TRANSPARENCY
Customers expect enterprise content in Ras be accessible to users and platforms with the least amount of manual steps possible. The problem is that many applications do not have the ability to store images or to import them from foreign platforms. The other problem is that many platforms may come delivered with their own document management solution, leaving your IT staff with three or more different platforms to support.
Your users want access to the insurance card, driver’s license and other documents without leaving the screens they are currently viewing.
The Ras API enables transparency by integrating Ras functionality into all of your existing platforms. Here is an illustration. A user may spend ninety percent of their day working accounts in your financial application, but for 5 percent of the day they need access to supporting documents like a scanned waiver, insurance card or payer verification document.
Until now, customers would login to Ras, find the patient account and open the document needed.
Ras API
The Ras Application Programming Interface, or Ras API, allows for improved workflows. While a user works a patient account in your primary financial application, they launch the Ras API with a singular click of a button. The Ras API is designed to know which patient you are viewing and which documents are needed based on the screen from which it is launched. This means that needed documents are just a click away with no navigating, no searching and no additional logins and passwords.
Users feel like the images are stored directly in their applications.
PERSISTENCE
Ras API will work with Siemens, Meditech, McKesson, Cerner, EPIC, NextGen and Keane. The fact is that the Ras API will work with ANY and ALL commercial applications as well as home-grown applications and websites.
| Will the Ras API to work with all EHRs to deliver scanned registration documents? |  |
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| Will it work with HR systems to delivery employee reviews? |
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| Will it deliver clinical documents to your web-based physician portal? |
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The examples of how the Ras API can simplify and extend your existing platforms are infinite.
Just give us a call to find out how the Ras API can simplify life for you and your users.
Or, download a PDF and learn more about the Ras API.
Improve Your Revenue Cycle with Ras
Thursday, October 27th, 2011| The clock is ticking down to January 1, 2012, and IT project managers are struggling with HIPAA X12 5010 compliance. Some HIT vendors are not ready, many payers are transmitting in non-compliant versions and claims scrubbers are choking on translations between vendors, payers and varying transaction set standards. So why is this so important? read more… |
Enterprise-wide Document Management Solution
Monday, June 6th, 2011As hospitals strive to achieve Meaningful Use of EHRs under the HITECH act, they find certified systems lack the ability to eliminate all paper-centric processes. EHR’s will improve healthcare over time, but greater efficiencies, improved processes and a paper-free environment will take years to achieve.
Paper will be the medium of choice for many workflows for the foreseeable future, and Document management can accelerate these processes and provide insight into deficiencies. As hospitals consider Document Management they must expand their focus beyond the management of patient processes. This myopic patient-centric view of document management leaves hospitals struggling to accommodate Administrative and Financial workflows. Hospitals implementing their HIT Vendor’s scanning and archiving solution may need to purchase another solution to accommodate vendor invoices, employment applications and licensing certifications.
Most hospitals do not consider enterprise needs as they access Document Management. This is especially true for hospitals replacing defunct platforms like VALCO. These hospitals seek a VALCO functional equivalent and are failing to take advantage of this opportunity to expand Document Management to the enterprise. If you are a VALCO customer you can call DBTech and we will transfer your existing VALCO data with our partner IATRIC Systems. Your new RAS system will manage invoice tracking, capital requests and any other paper-centric process within your hospital.
For hospitals considering the purchase of their HIT vendor’s scanning and archiving solution, be sure they are not just focusing on patient processes. For instance, many Meditech hospitals will claim their platform will manage AP, HR and other internal processes, but there are no reported clients using Scan & Archive beyond patient needs.
Whether you are looking for a new Document Management platform, or replacing VALCO, call DBTech and let us demonstrate a true Enterprise-wide Document Management solution.
Is That SharePoint or RAS
Tuesday, May 10th, 2011SharePoint is a popular collaboration tool to share documents between users and partners. Collaboration is the number one reason for implementing SharePoint according to a recent AIIM Strategies and Experiences White-Paper1.
SharePoint users push and tag documents with meta-data into SharePoint Team Sites. Team Sites act as the functional equivalent to RAS Folders.
Similarities between SharePoint and RAS end here, as a majority of SharePoint implementations have required third-party tools and consultants to reach functional levels of RAS.
A major SharePoint shortcoming is workflow. By workflow we mean the process of Document Routing, Document Approvals, Life-Cycle and Intelligent Document Management.
Document Routing has been a RAS mainstay since 1993, and includes tools to drive enterprise content, notify staff of new content and deliver data to critical workflows. RAS Workflow Automations push documents and alerts to users through email, smart phones and secured URL’s. Document data can be extracted and integrated with any third-party application. For instance, Patient Accounting users can scan Explanation of Benefits into RAS and interface payment data to receivable applications.
Document Approvals are a new RAS feature and permit sophisticated user-driven workflows. RAS Customers can establish multi-layer approvals for Vendor Invoices, Employment Applications and Capital Requests. In the coming months DBTech will announce an enhancement to RASi eForms that will drive online forms with sophisticated data-entry rules and integration with signature devices.
Life-Cycle is critical to Document Governance, and is a significant downside to SharePoint. RAS Customers have controlled Document Life-Cycle for well over 17 years, and can be assured that content is eliminated with minimal administrative intervention. Document Life-Cycle is extremely important for those organizations that must adhere to SOX compliance.
Intelligent Document Management (IDM) is a critical component to any serious Enterprise Content Management (ECM) implementation. IDM automates meta-data collection from foreign systems, applications and documents without end-user intervention. RAS Customers have enjoyed this feature for years. With IDM Face-sheets captured by RAS are analyzed for admitting physician, insurance and service to drive business processes, distribution and Workflows.
Please give DBTech a call if you are considering a SharePoint implementation. Our business is Enterprise Content Management and we can help you save significant funds by removing expensive third-party SharePoint gap solutions.
Reference
1. http://www.aiim.org/sharepoint/paper/sharepoint-industry-watch-report
Get a Grip on IT
Monday, April 4th, 2011By Greg Park
There was a very interesting article in the WSJ earlier this year.
It is impossible to secure all of your patient information.
That is the bottom line. All of your security measures, encryption securing data both at rest and in motion, and all role-based access to your data will not protect you from authorized users using data in unauthorized ways.
That being said, you still have to do everything you can to secure your data. You must apply the best security that is accessible to you. In that light I want to share with you best-practices on securing patient data in RAS and RASi.
Role-based access
Ensure RAS and RASi users see only documents required to complete their jobs. If your director of surgery uses RASi, make sure he or she only sees patients with a hospital service of surgery. Make sure that patient accounting users can’t see clinical reports. Lock down the ability to print copy or email to only necessary users, and then make sure you run detailed audit reports on those users.
Audit Files
RAS and RASi are chock-full of audit reports that can be scheduled and run on-demand. Reports can be run to analyze when PHI has been emailed, printed, copied or viewed. Make sure you look at this information and find out when PHI is replicated outside of your RAS or RASi environment.
Application Timeouts
Global time-outs can be established for RAS and RASi. Make sure you use this so that when user leave their screens another user won’t be able to snoop their session.
Encrypt Emails
Emails can be setup as an automated workflow or launched interactively by authorized RAS and RASi Users. Assure that RAS Auto-Emails containing PHI are encrypted, and then make sure that emailing and printing are your best options. Sometimes forcing outside recipients to view documents via RAS or RASi WEB are the best option, because once you print it or email it, you have abdicated control.
Hide PHI
There are ways that you can de-identify PHI in RAS reports using Monarch. Email gpark@dbtech.com if you want more information on how to do this.
These are simple steps that can go a long way towards protecting your PHI, but nothing beats a well informed user. Best practices entail assuring authorized users understand the implications of revealing PHI, and making sure they understand that you take their guardianship of this data seriously.
Can the Paper Tiger be Tamed
Monday, March 7th, 2011Can the Paper Tiger be Tamed
Document Management as an industry has been around since the eighties, yet still to this date (when we were supposed to have flying cars mind you) American companies are still waste tons of paper. AIIM, the nation’s leading organization devoted to content management, has estimates that one trillion pages are still printed, copied and faxed.
So what happened? Did we do something wrong?
No, you did nothing wrong. This is business as usual. Organization buy solutions to stop the hemorrhaging of some critical business issue then forget the solution when confronted with other document management needs. Some even go out and purchase another solution with overlapping functionality. Believe me I have seen it!
When you have a moment, review the link below. This slide-show is very insightful, and gives you a glimpse into the future of document management.
Once you finish reviewing this slideshow ask yourself this question, “What else can RAS do for me”. I guarantee you that you have only started to scratch the surface, and I am willing to prove it to you.
In the Cloud or the Cabinet: Where Should You Store Your Data?
Friday, January 28th, 2011Business News Daily takes a look at where you should store your data. As the paper problem grows, Process Redesign is needed to simply business Workflow. Intelligent Document Management can provide an immediate return on investment.
Will there be a day when the word “document” doesn’t imply a piece of paper? Will we ever become a truly paperless society?
Probably not any time soon, experts say. There’s a lot of pulp in the world. Take a look—it’s probably got your computer surrounded.
Start-ups and small businesses would be advised to give serious thought to document management questions. More and more, American business relies on data, so companies large and small need to consider how they should store it and what they might want or need to do with that data down the road.
Failure to build a dependable data management plan can be disastrous. Up to 70 percent of businesses that lose all their data go out of business within 12 to 18 months, said Eran Farajun, an executive vice president with Toronto-based Asigra, a developer of cloud storage software. Of course, all businesses have different needs.
So what is your business doing to protect itself from a data debacle?
PAPER
The Pros: Let’s be honest. Paper is that soft but ratty flannel shirt in the closet, the one you can’t bear to donate to Goodwill (or pitch into the trash). It’s comfortable and comforting, and it provides the same experience, time and again. That is, until it becomes so damaged that the sleeves fall right off.
We like that we can find a piece of paper, we can touch it or stick it in someone’s face to say, “Yes, I did pay that bill.”
The Cons: Where to start? Paper takes up a lot of space. It tears, the ink fades. Despite our best efforts, paper sometimes disappears into that file into which we never look. And we don’t have those same search capabilities that come with electronic storage. Furthermore, sharing a paper document requires you to make a copy, or scan, and that takes more time than accessing and e-mailing.
Paper will always have its place, said Greg Park of DBTech, a document management firm in Clark, N.J. “You can’t push for technology just for technology’s sake,” he said. “It has to make sense.”
But it’s making more sense these days to get most data into a digital format.
LOCAL ELECTRONIC STORAGE: From the tiniest thumb drive to the heartiest serverThe Pros: When you have one box at your workplace containing all your stored electronic data, one thing is certain: you have control. This is true especially if a company employs robust security.
Another upside for onsite storage is cost, which continues to plummet. You can find a terabyte of storage for less than $100, unheard of a couple years ago.
The Cons: With control comes great responsibility. Data doesn’t necessarily back itself up. (Well, it can, but such processes still require human intervention.)
“Backup is like exercise,” said Asigra’s Farajun. “Everyone knows they should do it, but few do it really well.” That said, if someone in your organization has exceptional discipline and attention to detail, a server or hard drive might work.
CLOUD or OFF-SITE STORAGEThese days we hear a lot about the cloud, but perhaps not everyone knows what it means. Data stored in the cloud can be accessed via the Internet from remote locations. One of the fastest-growing examples of cloud computing is Google Docs, whereby users can create word processing, spreadsheets and other documents that they then can access through the Web.
The Pros: The cloud, when done well, is easy. As suggested above, cloud storage puts responsibilities of backup and access onto the provider. In essence, the cloud allows enterprises to attend to their core business and spend less time on the IT function.
“Be a user, not an owner,” suggests Farajun. “Capital outlays are really expensive when you’re starting out,” he said.
Cloud storage compares more closely to renting space. And cloud storage costs have plunged, just like hard drive prices. Farajun pointed out that businesses can contract for the amount of space they need in the foreseeable future. Most businesses, he explained, don’t need a terabyte of space. Cloud storage allows them to get 100 gigabytes if that’s all they need.
The Cons: Companies whose business involves sensitive data should have reservations about cloud storage. And if they go that route, they should do some homework on providers.
Farajun suggests that companies pay close attention to encryption. He encourages users to ask about how the data will be encrypted when it’s offsite and en route. And companies need to understand whether their provider will have the encryption key. For some businesses, that’s okay. For other businesses, with more sensitive data, they may not want anyone to have the key.
Park and DBTech work mainly in the health care industry. Clearly, the data privacy needs are different in that arena, which is why his clients are careful about getting into the cloud.
Whether you want your data in the cloud or in a utility closet on site, it’s most important to think about what you’ll need that information for. Then, ask lots of questions.
Please Contact Us to learn more about how RAS can help you save time, paper and money.