Andres Jimenez, M.D., is an advocate of the clinical automation, but he’s not too impressed with the industry track record with electronic health records implementations. By his estimate, about 50 percent of EHR implementations fail. In addition, for all the focus on computerized physician order entry systems, only about 250 hospitals nationwide have achieved “deep” CPOE use, where more than 85 percent of providers are entering orders directly into a CPOE system.

The root cause for the wheels coming off clinical automation projects often is the way hospitals approach EHR training for physicians, contends Jimenez, a practicing spine specialist and CEO of consulting firm ImplementHIT. Jimenez previously served as clinical director of content and online training at Allscripts.

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“Physicians simply haven’t been trained correctly and have struggled getting to advanced levels of I.T.-enabled clinical documentation,” he says. “And it’s only going to get worse as we move forward. The industry is replacing specialty EHR systems with enterprise systems not built with anyone specific in mind—which means it’s tough for all specialties to pick up and use.”

Jimenez’s company markets e-learning systems that combine classroom and online training to address two “endpoints”: minimizing the lost productivity associated with EHR implementations, and getting physicians trained on advanced features. “Studies show the physician productivity losses average between $7,000 and $10,000 during an implementation, and that cost in clinical hours is simply too much. And to get any real value from an EHR, physicians have to be able to use the most advanced features. Anything less seriously reduces the clinical and financial benefits of EHRs.”

Jimenez will present an e-session at HIMSS11 titled “Hybrid EHR Training: Maximize Adoption & Physician Productivity.” HIMSS e-sessions are 20-minute multimedia education modules that can be accessed during the show in Room 204A, Lobby D. The co-speaker on the e-session is Margie Cornwell from St. Vincent Health, which utilized OptimizeHIT’s online/classroom training program. ImplementIT also will exhibit at booth 3385.

Practices have tasks that need to be done regularly to ensure smooth operations. Health information technology adds a new set of recurring chores. These tasks generally are broken down as those needed for maintenance, those that help protect and secure patient data, and those that help the practice get the best return on investment, both from financial and quality standpoints.

Responsibility for these tasks varies, depending on the size, scope and structure of the practice. Here are some common tasks.

Assessing user concerns

What it entails: Performing regular check-ins with staff to determine the good, bad and ugly of each system. Some practices have lunch-and-learn sessions during which employees brainstorm and share user experiences. Others have a more informal process, with open lines of communication between users and those who can optimize, customize and tweak systems. Experts say this assessment should happen frequently right after implementation, and should continue on an ongoing basis.

Why it matters: Andres Jimenez, MD, CEO of ImplementHIT, an online provider of electronic medical record system training, said that with fewer players in the EMR market today, the systems aren’t as intuitive for each specialty as they could be. Regular check-ins with staff will help practices configure the systems to meet their needs.

These regular check-ins also can help practices identify training gaps and adjust to changing environments. For example, Dr. Jimenez said, many practices set up protocols to deal with the outbreak of influenza A(H1N1). Or practices might realize that certain tests or medications are ordered frequently, so the system could create shortcuts to those orders.

What a physician has to do: If the physician is a “super user,” he or she likely will be on the team in charge of acting on feedback. Physicians who don’t use the system as much need to practice using it, thinking about ways the experience can be improved.

Taking care of system infrastructure

What it entails: Monitoring network connectivity to ensure that the practice stays online; monitoring for software or operating system upgrades; and monitoring database storage space.

Why it matters: According to Jeff Cunningham, chief technology officer for the Nashville, Tenn.-based vendor Informatics Corp. of America, these tasks ensure that your system remains in good working order. Good network connectivity, for example, will ensure that all computers in the practice are talking to one another. Software or operating system updates, which often are prompted by glitches reported by users of earlier versions, improve the user experience. Finally, databases that have run out of electronic storage space will prevent practices from storing and backing up files.

Losing this ability to properly store and back up files could hamper a practice’s ability to operate smoothly and in a way compliant with regulations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.

What a physician has to do: Physicians must ensure that whoever performs these tasks understands the system and the network and how they function, experts say. For many small practices without a large information technology budget, it might be worthwhile to outsource these tasks, or to go with a hosted system, meaning that the server hardware is located elsewhere. In that case, these tasks would be performed by the host.

Monitoring system access and managing passwords

What it entails: Creating unique log-in credentials for each user; ensuring that passwords are hard to guess and changed frequently; and deleting access for employees who leave the practice.

Why it matters: HIPAA laws require that each user of a health information technology system have a unique log-in and identifier. One reason is to restrict access to patient files. Unique credentials also make it possible to do audits of file access.

What a physician has to do: Michael Leonard, project manager for the IT team at Iron Mountain, an information management services company based in Boston, said physician partners need to set policies that define what an appropriate password is and set a schedule for when they are changed, normally every 90 days.

Experts say that although it shouldn’t be up to physicians to serve as administrators who set and manage credentials, doctors need to know how to log in as an administrator to perform these tasks if the assigned administrator leaves the practice unexpectedly.

Performing security and HIPAA audits

What it entails: Regularly reviewing who has access to what systems and what patient health records might be exposed.

Why it matters: These audits will help practices mitigate the risk of data exposure. As roles change, as they often do in small practices, the data an employee needs to do his or her job also is likely to change. HIPAA security rules require that practices have administrative safeguards in place to protect all patient information.

What a physician has to do: Physicians need to set policy about how often audits should take place. System or practice administrators can perform these tasks, but physicians always should be told what those audits have found, experts say. Regular meetings or reports will help keep doctors informed.

Backing up files

What it entails: Instituting a regular backup schedule that occurs no less than several times a week; storing data either virtually or on portable devices.

Why it matters: HIPAA and security rules require practices to secure patient information. Backing up those files is among several best practices that physicians should adopt to ensure that a disaster, whether technical or natural, doesn’t cause permanent loss of patient files.

What a physician has to do: If data are stored on portable devices, such as tapes or memory cards, a service should be contracted that will pick them up and store them off-site.

Lior Blik, president and CEO of Network Infrastructure Technologies, a New York-based IT solutions firm, said that when data are backed up virtually, most programs send alerts indicating that the backup was successful and detailing what was backed up. While someone else, such as a practice administrator, could actually send data to storage, the physician needs to be the one who receives the backup message.

“I would definitely make sure I get involved in that if I were a physician,” Blik said. “That is a key you definitely don’t want to lose, because this is your business.”

Practices that use hosted systems most likely would have this done for them by the host, but the practice should learn how data are stored. Blik also suggests that physician partners run a data recovery test every few weeks to ensure that storage and recovery processes are working.

Analyzing financial and clinical performance

What it entails: Taking a measurement of how the system is affecting finances and clinical performance by comparing pre-implementation numbers with post-implementation measures. An analysis can run queries by demographics, diagnostic codes, labs, medications and vitals, or a combination of these, and on financial information.

Why it matters: Reviews will help a practice identify its return on investment for its system. The analysis will help the practice identify areas that need further improvement, and areas that an EMR already helped to improve. Reviews also will help a practice prove its case for bonuses or incentives under any insurance plan’s program encouraging information technology use, including meaningful use under Medicare and Medicaid.

What a physician has to do: If the physician is not doing the actual queries, he or she needs to be aware of the results. “If you’re not able to measure at all, you can’t improve,” said Chad Kerr, a health information technology consultant with Ingenix Consulting based in Eden Prairie, Minn.

Monitoring the changing health IT landscape

What it entails: Keeping an eye on emerging technologies to determine the ones your staff might try to incorporate into their work lives.

Why it matters: Kerr said that if practices don’t know what up-and-coming technologies employees might be trying to use, employees might try technologies that won’t be supported by the existing infrastructure. Wireless devices and personal computers are perfect examples, he said, as new tools are being introduced every six months.

What a physician has to do: Physicians need to stay on top of technology trends by reading technology news or blogs, and by talking to employees about new devices they may want to incorporate into the practice. Physicians also should talk with vendors or information technology staff to determine what devices or technology could be supported in a secure, HIPAA-compliant way.

Dr. Steve McCullough is a proponent of using speech recognition software with an electronic health record (EHR) system for two reasons—it saves him time and money.

In 2005, his practice, Western Kentucky Kidney Specialists, began using an EHR and by early 2006 integrated it with speech recognition software from Dragon Medical so the physicians could dictate notes using speech recognition. Previously, each of the practice’s 12 physicians spent nearly $12,000 annually for transcription costs.

“This was a shared expense,” says McCullough, one of the partners of the Paducah, Ky.-based practice. “Even though some of the physicians were high utilizers, this expense was split evenly among the partners.”

After transitioning to Dragon, the practice changed its cost paradigm—transcription services became a line item expense, prompting eight physicians to switch to speech recognition, collectively saving the practice nearly a quarter of a million dollars.

The time savings is just as dramatic, adds Dr. Andres Jimenez, CEO of Las Vegas-based Implementhit.com, Inc., which helps practices make better use of technology, such as electronic medical records systems. 

“Notes would have to remain un-finalized until the audio file from the physicians is transmitted to the transcriptionist, the audio transcribed, the text transmitted back to the physician for review, verification for accuracy and signature,” Jimenez notes.  “Although in modern times that loop was typically completed in 24 to 48 hours, it was wrought for the potential for error on behalf of the transcriptionist, and additional liability exposure for the physician who would have to quickly review and signoff on sometimes 60+ transcriptions from a single day.” 

Additionally, it’s nearly impossible for the physician to ensure the transcriptionist is accurate in every sentence of a transcription of an audio, spoken at about 100 words per minute, and the separation of time also makes this task difficult. 

“Voice recognition changes all of that,” says Jimenez. “Physicians can dictate and immediately see the text appear in their EHR. They can immediately review the text for accuracy, and sign off on the text while the patient’s history was fresh in their mind.  The immediate impact on time and money is apparent as well as the long term impact by reducing liability exposure.” 

Slow adoption of speech recognition software

Several issues are still holding back speech recognition. First is the issue of accuracy; it was only until recently that voice recognition software has improved its accuracy rate. 

“Because locating, highlighting, and correcting individual errors are tedious, even a five to 10 percent error rate in accuracy would eliminate the speed benefit of voice recognition,” explains Jimenez. “This was the edge provided by human transcription that in recent times via computer hardware advances has been eliminated.” 

Jimenez says that voice recognition software like Dragon or Microsoft Vista’s speech recognition (free with Windows Vista) program, receive over 1MBs of data provided by the microphone and rapidly process the data to produce transcription accuracy rates as high as 97 to 98 percent.

“Even more impressive is those accuracy rates can be achieved with less than 1 hour of voice training with the application,” he says. “The major obstacle today for more widespread adoption however was that voice recognition did not produce discrete data, or codified data that could in turn initiate alerts or warnings, or help recommend appropriate billing levels for an encounter.” 

As a result, the text is meaningless from a database and connectivity point of view, and that won’t support the industry needs since an EHR needs to collect as much discrete data as possible to allow sharing patient information between two different doctors caring for the same patients using two different EHRs. 

“This is a center point of health information exchanges and by making it easy to share information, fewer tests are repeated because results couldn’t be found, less morbidity occurs because even the most trivial of medical tests come with potential complications, and doctors can make better informed decisions on a patient’s care because they have all of the information they need at their disposal,” Jimenez adds. “Over the last several years the capture of discrete data has been made possible. Natural language processing software takes the text generated from voice recognition and codifies it, exporting discrete data on the other side.”

McCullough believes that speech recognition has been slow to catch on for the same reasons why EHR hasn’t quite caught on. “Prior to some of these mandates, and the initiating drive force from the economic stimulus package, physicians, overall, are people who are fearfully reluctant to change,” he says. “When you get into a routine, it’s very difficult to change that attitude and to change that work paradigm.”

Dr. Robert Turner of the Kelsey Seybold Clinic in Houston says the biggest problem is the learning curve at the beginning. “You have to train the program to your way of speaking,” he says. “To become slick and fast with it, you need to do some studying in learn how to use it.”

Also, for those physicians who are not technologically sophisticated, they could struggle with it, Turner adds. “If you use computers all the time, some of the things that are involved in speech recognition software are intuitive,” he notes. “But if you don’t, then you’re not intuitive, and you have to learn them all the commands. That means slowing yourself down; lessening your productivity; seeing fewer patients—of course, that could be problematic.” 

Maximizing speech recognition in EHRs

If you plan to purchase speech recognition software, a good microphone is essential to maximize its effectiveness. A high quality microphone will ensure better accuracy and get you better results.

“Mics are a huge issue—the software is only as good as your microphone,” says Jimenez. “If you’re using a package like Dragon, we suggest you use the ones they recommend on their site.”

Jimenez says that some vendors will also offer wireless connection, a plus for those physicians using a Tablet PC.

If you want to speed up even the most menial tasks pertaining to EHR, McCullough recommends taking advantage of the macro features that you can build with your software.

“Our IT person helped us create keystroke macros so when you finished a document you can use a voice command, like ‘sign document,” and the Dragon software would go through the steps to click the sign button, type in your password, and click enter, and the document was finished,” McCullough says. “Little things like that were added to speed things up. I also created document macros, where I can say ‘ultrasound report,’ and the software would print out a document that had certain variables that I can go into and edit, and I don’t have to dictate an entire note from scratch.”

McCullough also urges users to take their time with the software after you open it from the box and to try to use it as often as possible. Each software package comes with its own set of simple training tools. Typically, you’d have to spend about 10 to 15 minutes reading from pre-packaged texts to create your own customized audio file.

“The more you use the software, the better it will become,” says McCullough.  

Choosing a speech recognition program
 
While Dragon may dominate the speech recognition market, practices still like to have a choice. When looking at various software packages, the most important feature for McCullough was user-friendliness. 

“You cannot have a layer of complexity,” McCullough asserts. “When you are working in the office you need a particular workflow. If you have to stop what you are doing to troubleshoot problems, it’s incredibly aggravating and ruins the workflow and that product will not work for you.”

No matter what product you ultimately choose, McCullough urges practices to give speech recognition a try. “If any physicians are somewhat computer savvy and are comfortable with computers, but the bullet and try it,” he says. “At about $1,600 per license for a package like Dragon, when you look at that expense, it’s a drop in the bucket compared to other expenses you have.”

Turner says that the technology will only get better.

“Voice recognition software is not going away,” he says. “The difference between four years ago and today is like night and day. The improvement from five years ago is immense. My presumption is that the sophistication of the software will continue to improve going forward, and the progress four to five years from now will be just as significant.”

The implementation of EHR technology has some great, tangible benefits – more compact storage, greater efficiency, improvements in patient care, et cetera.  However, many physicians are slow to adopt new technologies, especially if their practice doesn’t have an information technology department, because of the high initial investment required. 

It takes a great deal of time to learn how to use a new system, and it can be difficult for many healthcare providers to obtain enough training to achieve meaningful use of the new technology.

ImplementHIT, a company run by physicians and clinical/medical informatics experts, has developed a new program which may help solve this program. 

OptimizeHIT is specifically designed and priced to help smaller practices (of 20 doctors or fewer) implement EHR technology, and accomplish meaningful use guidelines, in a self-paced online environment. 

The basis for the program is ImplementHIT’s existing training program for hospitals and larger organizations.  Utilizing this program, healthcare providers can learn how to use the systems effectively, and even begin using some of the more advanced functions of the technology. 


This will help avoid lost productivity, both during training and after, and ensure that they are enjoying all of the benefits that EHR technology has to offer.

OptimizeHIT’s online training sessions allow healthcare providers to access the trainings anytime, anywhere.   “Doctors can participate from home, at their leisure. For the providers, that’s one of the absolute best benefits,” said Jim Garrity, chief information officer of the Tucson Orthopaedic Institute (TOI). “They are seeing value in the education.


Coupled with the cost effectiveness of the online learning, this is putting TOI on track to save hundreds of hours of training time for providers alone.”

“The biggest impediment to meaningful use is meaningful education. We see evidence of that in the very small percentage of hospitals and practices using the advanced features of their EMR, like computerized physician order entry (CPOE) with problem based order sets, electronic charge submission and prescription transmission,” stated Dr. Jimenez, a former clinical director of content and online training for Allscripts, a popular EHR/EMR program developer.  “These features are critical because they enhance workflows, and lead to the significant healthcare quality benefits promised by EMR vendors.”

http://implementhit.com

Some physicians are finding that their practice is not achieving an increase in productivity after implementation of an electronic medical records (EMR) program.  This can sometimes be caused by a mismatch between the specific EMR program they are using and their specialty.

A study was done at the University of California at Davis, to see how the implementation of electronic medical records programs affected the productivity of six different practices. 


They discovered that there was an initial decrease in productivity during the training period, which is to be expected; however, after this period, internists were able to recover their productivity, and actually increased it over what it was before the implementation of the EMR technology, whereas pediatricians and family doctors weren’t able to realize their former productivity. 

The EMR system used by all six practices was the same, and it more closely matched the work flow of the internists, who had to enter radiology images, and viewing notes from previous visits and treatment.  The work of the family physicians, however, had to do with very different tasks – constantly entering new data, and recording measurements – which were actually made more difficult with the EMR. 

Doctors were used to entering data manually, with pen and paper, and using the new technology made them operate more slowly, even after the initial training period. 

Hemant Bhargava, PhD., is the associate dean and professor of management and computer science at the UC Davis Graduate School of Management, led the study. 

He felt that all six practices could have realized an increase in their productivity if they had adopted different versions of the EMR system, each of which was tailored to their specific needs. 

The problem of choosing the right electronic medical records program has become more and more obvious as healthcare organizations scramble to purchase and implement the programs in order to make themselves eligible for financial incentives. 


As the programs are adopted without enough careful consideration, and most of the decision-makers aren’t aware of the differences between the programs, more and more physicians find themselves bogged down with software that doesn’t fit their needs well. 


Unfortunately, this gives a poor reputation to a new (and usually efficient and beneficial) technology, one which is not completely deserved.  If more consideration is given to the type of EMR system being implemented, many more practices will realize an increase in their productivity as a result of utilizing the technology properly.http://implementhit.com

How do we train hundreds of thousands of doctors to become meaningful users in a year or two in time for full stimulus incentives?
With technology, that’s how.
Meaningful use of a certified EHR was recently defined by the Health Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act enacted as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009. Signed into law by President Obama, HITECH provides a benchmark for the attainment of federal incentive bonuses initiated to help drive the adoption of health information technology (HIT) across the nation. Over the next five years, hundreds of thousands of doctors will be trading their pens or dictaphones for template-driven computer applications promising to not only store charts, but transmit prescriptions electronically, provide up-to-date decision support on the delivery of patient care and cut down on administrative waste by electronically submitting visit charges to payers.
Advanced technology, such as the Allscripts Enterprise EHR, already delivers on much of this functionality, aiding in achieving certification and helping doctors transform healthcare. However, for hospitals and physician practices to fully adopt these highly sophisticated EHRs and qualify for HITECH Act incentives by demonstrating meaningful use, they must incorporate computer-based training technology.
Physician participation and motivation is critical
Most HIT leaders would agree that training is one of the most important aspects of implementing new technology - especially certified EHRs with advanced functionality. However, the challenge many encounter with any type of training strategy is getting the doctors to participate and maintain a high level of attention to ensure meaningful learning.
Many HIMSS Nicholas E. Davies Award of Excellence recipients have achieved excellence through significant investments in training. This award recognizes excellence in implementation and attaining value from HIT with a special emphasis on EHRs. One award recipient, Multicare Health System, amended its medical staff bylaws to require EHR training and competency in order for staff to maintain privileges. As one can imagine, this is a very powerful motivating factor, especially when combined with awarding CME credit for participating in training. Unfortunately, many obstacles exist that can hamper training efforts.
EHR implementations are plagued with failure rates as high as 50 percent, depending on how success is defined. One commonly cited failure involves a large hospital system in southern California that failed implementation of computerized physician order entry (CPOE). Despite significant resources, strong leadership and experience in informatics, the CPOE system had to be uninstalled because of configuration challenges and lack of physician support.
Several studies have looked at physician age and adoption of HIT, such as an EHR. Soumerai and colleagues (1998) found that older physicians are less likely to change their practice of medicine even when presented with evidence that alternative approaches yield improved outcomes. Burt and Sisk (2005) found that physicians older than 60 were less likely to adopt than younger physicians, but they thought this might be related to these doctors being less comfortable with computers. Examining how this might tie into practice characteristics, it turns out that older physicians are less likely to work in large practice settings. Physicians age 55 and older represent 22 percent of physicians in practices of two to four physicians and 12 percent of those working in groups of five to nine physicians (Kane, 2004). Going full circle, the selection and adoption of an EHR is greatly influenced by the size of the practice. Enterprise EHRs, commonly selected by larger organizations, are expected to meet the needs of many specialties across an organization. They are known to be less “natural” than those systems designed for a single specialty, and thus they are more difficult to adopt.
Understanding the differences in physician and practice characteristics, their impact on adoption, as well as motivating factors that can enhance learning under these same conditions is critical to developing effective training.
E-learning increases productivity
Technology has proven highly effective in many industries as a means to facilitate training to drive productivity within an organization. As early as the 1980s, Motorola studied the impact of its Motorola University, finding a return on investment of $30 for every dollar invested in training (Brandenberg, 1987). Today, most Fortune 500 companies have sophisticated human-resource applications interfacing with a learning management system (LMS), where managers can enroll and monitor employees’ participation in continuing education. Many have taken courses like this, typically in regards to HIPAA compliance or code of ethics within the healthcare field.
The power of technology to influence productivity really comes from several core factors: convenience to access, ease of tracking participation and scalability of distribution. Also, taking into account the targeted group of adult learners, power also comes from immediately providing relevance on how the training will benefit the learner. Threshold time for providing this relevance is even more critical for e-learning. Thus, the full benefit of technology can only be realized if the online training, or e-learning initiatives, are developed appropriately and take into account the full breadth of variables that can affect learning.
Effective e-learning is customized
EHR training should be relevant to physicians’ specialties. Can you imagine having a neurosurgeon take time from her busy schedule to sit down in front of a computer to complete a training module that references the clinical scenario of a 21-year-old athlete who planted and twisted his right knee, felt a pop and now presents with right-knee pain and swelling? Such a situation loses out on the opportunity to grab the learner’s attention by providing immediate relevance. It will also most likely turn the learner off from any additional learning.
Now imagine the orthopedic surgeon who operates on 10 knees a day encountering the same scenario. He not only becomes immediately engaged, he begins to activate prior knowledge regarding the care for such a patient. This makes the absorption of new knowledge about the EHR far more efficient, according to well-established learning theory (such as schema theory). The concept of customization to provide immediate clinical relevance makes perfect sense. However, it wasn’t commonplace among most enterprise-level, multi-specialty organizations incorporating e-learning into their implementation plans because customizing computer-based training for each specialty was complex and cost prohibitive - until recently.
ImplementHIT specializes in e-learning for Allscripts, incorporating the use of patent-pending technology to swap out different clinical scenarios, depending on the specialty of the physicians being trained. Through the use of this advanced online simulation technology, ImplementHIT customizes learning to replicate the EHR exactly as configured by the user organization. With highly sophisticated systems, such as the Allscripts Enterprise EHR and its V11 Note module (a problem-based, template-driven documentation tool that renders text via the clicks on a form to capture discrete data), online learning can also provide a means for physicians to learn about clinical content, such as what is available on a form for chest pain, even before going live with the system. This level of customization and simulation makes the transition from training to live environment less stressful for doctors and results in higher levels of adoption.
When appropriately implemented, online learning becomes a scalable tool that allows few to train many. With robust tracking, it can enable an organization to continuously improve, and via convenient, anytime/anyplace access, it makes it possible for learners to advance their knowledge of the EHR at their own pace.
The ROI of online EHR training
Using e-learning reduce the amount of training time prior to EHR implementation. This approach keeps physicians in the clinic longer and lessens the impact on their productivity and revenue-generating activities. E-learning for the Allscripts Enterprise EHR produces ROIs of $6 to $10 for every dollar invested in training. More importantly, this drives EHR adoption that will result in meaningful use targeted by the HITECH Act, leading to improved patient care and
reduced costs.
http://implementhit.com

Despite the obvious benefits to utilizing EHR technology – more efficient record-keeping processes, time and money saved, improvements in patient care – many physicians, particularly those whose practices don’t have an information technology department, are slow to adopt new systems.  There is a high initial financial investment required, but more importantly, it is difficult for many healthcare providers to obtain enough training to achieve meaningful use of the new technology.

A company called ImplementHIT, led by physicians and experts in clinical and medical informatics, has come up with a solution to this problem. 

Their patent-pending software, called OptimizeHIT, can help smaller healthcare organizations to implement EHR technology, and achieve meaningful use guidelines, in a self-paced e-learning environment. 

The program is based on ImplementHIT’s training program that is already being used for hospitals and large healthcare organizations, but OptimizeHIT is specially designed for small practices with 20 or fewer doctors. The program promotes usage of some of the more advanced functions of EHR technology. 


By learning how to achieve meaningful use of the new systems, physicians and their staff can avoid lost productivity, and be sure they are utilizing the software to its fullest potential.

The low percentage of physicians that have adopted EHR technology has made experts question whether healthcare professionals are effectively participating and engaging in all of the functions of EHR programs. 

OptimizeHIT is designed to ensure that they are, by helping practices to customize the training content offered to fit the needs of their organization.

One of the best features of OptimizeHIT is that the training sessions are web-based, which allows physicians and their staff to access the trainings whenever and wherever it’s convenient.  “Doctors can participate from home, at their leisure.

For the providers, that’s one of the absolute best benefits,” said Jim Garrity, chief information officer of the Tucson Orthopaedic Institute (TOI). “They are seeing value in the education. Coupled with the cost effectiveness of the online learning, this is putting TOI on track to save hundreds of hours of training time for providers alone.”

“The biggest impediment to meaningful use is meaningful education. We see evidence of that in the very small percentage of hospitals and practices using the advanced features of their EMR, like computerized physician order entry (CPOE) with problem based order sets, electronic charge submission and prescription transmission,” stated Dr. Jimenez, a former clinical director of content and online training for Allscripts, a popular EHR/EMR program developer.  “These features are critical because they enhance workflows, and lead to the significant healthcare quality benefits promised by EMR vendors.”

NJTC 2011 Venture Conference Award Winners

Best Information Technology” award went to ImplementHIT, a Las Vegas company that creates training solution for electronic medical health records

http://implementhit.com

The American government enacted the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 to help the nation’s economy recover from a decade-long slump.  ARRA was designed to help promote interest in investing in American goods and technologies.  The Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act, an integral part of ARRA concerning healthcare information technology, was signed into law in February 2009.  ARRA and HITECH established goals for healthcare providers, which included the implementation of two new technologies.  Electronic health records (EHRs) and electronic medical records (EMRs) are two relatively new systems which can help healthcare practitioners to improve the quality of care they can provide for their patients. 

            To encourage healthcare organizations to begin utilizing this new technology, the Center for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) partnered with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT (ONC) to create financial incentives for physicians who elected to implement the technology.  CMS/ONC established basic guidelines for “meaningful use” of health information technology, which must be met before organizations can be eligible for these incentives.  The guidelines for “meaningful use” are essentially intended to ensure that providers are utilizing the EMR/EHR technology in a qualitatively productive way, and using it to realize material improvements in patient care. 

            The process of implementing these technological systems and achieving “meaningful use” was broken down into three segments that span six years.  The first stage, starting in 2011, simply requires healthcare providers to prove that they are using EMRs and EHRs for a certain percentage of their patients and that their existing patient data is slowly being converted into digital format.  The second stage takes place from 2013 to 2015, and requires caregivers to show that they taking the EMR data into account when they diagnose and treat patients.  The third and final stage, ending in 2017, requires healthcare providers to identify national trends, give patients tools to help them manage their own care, and improve the overall health of the nation’s population, by properly utilizing EMR technology.

http://implementhit.com