Posts Tagged ‘EMR – Electronic Medical Records’
Saphner: Elekta Impac software holds our practice together. We use it at both of our main offices; at the branch clinics, one has switched, one in process and we have two more to go. Once we achieve that, we’ll all be on the system.
The real ROI happens after work patterns change, and that doesn’t happen until the last doctor converts. Once that happens, you see benefits in many aspects. Once all doctors are on Impac you no longer need paper charts. One goal is to get all doctors to approve treatment plans on the computer, and the majority has already made that conversion.
Willard: At go-live, we were a privately owned physician group strictly focused on medical oncology. In 2008, the hospital purchased the practice, so now we’re hospital owned and based.
Our goal is to merge databases with the separate radiation oncology department and have a unified patient record, since we see about 85-87% of the same patients. We’re working to integrate with radiation oncology and interface with the hospital’s McKesson computer system.
About Our Experts
Terry McKay
President and CEO
West Michigan Cancer Center
Kalamazoo, MI
www.wmcc.org
West Michigan Cancer Center is a cooperative program for cancer treatment of the two major healthcare facilities in the Kalamazoo area, Bronson Methodist Hospital and Borgess Medical Center, which consolidates the non-surgical cancer treatment services formerly located throughout the area. The center averages nearly 80,000 patient visits annually, with more than 120 employees in 55,000 square feet of space.
Thomas Saphner, M.D., FACP
Principle Investigator
St. Vincent Regional Cancer Center CCOP
Green Bay Oncology
Green Bay, WI
As principle investigator for the St. Vincent Regional Cancer Center, Thomas Saphner, M.D., FACP, leads the prestigious Community Clinical Oncology Program (CCOP) as designated by the National Cancer Institute. The designation makes St. Vincent one of only 63 major cancer research sites in 34 states, District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.
Kim Willard
Impac Systems Administrator
Palmetto Hematology Oncology Clinic
Spartanburg, SC
www.palmettoho.com
Purchased by Spartanburg Regional Hospital System in 2008, the Palmetto Hematology Oncology Clinic has 88 employees, five physicians as well as five local offices. The clinic is affiliated with the famed MD Anderson Clinic and provides state-of-the-art cancer care for residents of upstate South Carolina.
As an EMR solution, MOSAIQ® is committed to certifying under the HiTech Act, part of the $787 billion Stimulus Bill passed on February 17, 2009.
For more information, visit www.elekta.com/hitech
McKay: I have mature physicians, and we all use it for medical oncology and radiation oncology. They’ve become enthusiastic supporters. When they look at an enhancement, they’ll ask, “How many clicks is it?” They’ve gotten pretty sophisticated.
Willard: The key to our success was to put together an implementation team composed of someone from all departments. This team had a lot of meetings, timelines and roadmaps. Now that we have implementation, we have quarterly Impac staff meetings, with all 88 employees in one big room. During this time we review errors, process changes and discuss how to improve our processes. We also have an ongoing education process. We meet two times a year with each employee for 15 minutes, one-on-one. During this time we review their information needs and capabilities for using the system so we truly understand their processes and needs. We also meet quarterly with different departments.
Next
Q. What was the patient reaction to the EMR?
Q. What is the biggest change at your center since implementing MOSAIQ software?
McKay: The best thing has been the tremendous calm in the office. We’re not running around, looking for charts. We had college students working for us just finding records. And there are no overhead pages, because those were always searches for records.
Saphner: Productivity has really improved. We had a legion of people in medical records, and it cost us five bucks to pull a chart. When you think about all the times you pull those charts, it was a lot of money. We saw that an enormous amount of energy was wasted looking for charts and even handling charts. EMR is always available to us, even if we’re at home. And if you have downtime at a satellite clinic, you can use the time online, approving documents.
Willard: The improved workflow as a result of EMR has been the most visible part of the program. You don’t have four health information personnel walking around looking for charts. Charts are available at the tips of your fingers, and can be securely accessed and reviewed from home on any configured computer with an internet connection.
Next Blog Post:
Q. Do you consider yourself at the forefront of technology, since you are an early adopter of EMR?
• Life with Lars Leksell on page 8, written from the perspective of his son, Dan Leksell, Executive Vice President and Senior Advisor at Elekta, provides insight into the history of the company and the man who built it.
• See how a 17-year-old cancer survivor becomes an advocate for teens across the globe – her heartfelt story on page 24.
• On page 34, learn more about the benefits three centers have experienced using MOSAIQ® – Elekta’s EMR solution that’s set the bar by which all other radiation and medical oncology information systems are measured.
• On page 40, we go behind the scene for a glimpse of the development of Elekta’s new Monaco® treatment planning system with VMAT as well as the group behind its development.
Enjoy this issue of Wavelength!
Wavelength
HOPE
The Randolph Cancer Center has been awarded the Hematology & Oncology Practice Excellence (HOPE) Award for Expense Control by Hematology & Oncology News & Issues magazine.
This award signifies Randolph Cancer Center as a leader, both administratively and clinically, among the cancer center practices of its size in the country.
The HOPE Awards recognize and advance excellence, and help practices gauge its success. In cooperation with corporate partners and sponsors, the awards are a part of a three-year initiative designed to encourage the development of practice standards of excellence in community-based cancer treatment centers.
The three main goals of the initiative are to identify measurable business standards, quantify a set of criteria within each standard that can be applied across practices and recognize the practices that exhibit excellence among its peers.
Randolph Cancer Center received this award for its focus on Electronic Medical Records (EMR) implementation, workflow analysis and staff accountability. Adoption of EMR and moving toward a paperless system has been common among HOPE award winning facilities.
EMR calculates the medicine dosage, length of time given and provides alerts for medical conflicts. While chemo volumes increased by 36 percent during the first three months of operation at Randolph Cancer Center, EMR had a large impact on decreasing nurse charting time.
Volume increases also led to the need for a workflow analysis, or the process by which patients were scheduled. After examining the EMR system, they determined most patients could bypass check out.
“Our new process eliminated patient wait time, which increased patient satisfaction and allowed us to maintain one staff position for scheduling,” said Stacey Bannister, executive director of Randolph Cancer Center. “This year we decided to hold each person on the team accountable for finding at least one cost saving idea. We didn’t focus on the amount of savings but rather getting 100 percent to participate in seeking ways to reduce expenses.”
To read the remainder of this article, please continue to: http://www.randolphguide.com/business/local_story_205091706.html
MOSAIQ EMR
The official grand opening of the center will take place November 1, 2009 and feature a special performance by Stories on Stage of “The Calling to Care” – an original production that tells the stories of those who dedicate their lives to caring for cancer patients – as well as tours of the new facility.
The new center brings together in one place ESJH’s Breast Care Center, cancer psychosocial services, medical and surgical oncology, a cancer laboratory, a research department, a new cancer pharmacy and the Infusion Center. Perhaps more important, it will provide a new standard for integrated care offered by an eminently qualified team of physicians and staff, led by Medical Director Dr. Richard Hesky and Executive Director Michele Carey.
“What distinguishes the program are not just the services we provide but how we have put them together so that our cancer professionals – from oncologists to lab technicians to psychotherapists to infusion specialists to radiologists – interact with one another to provide fully coordinated care to each patient,” says Carey.
One key to the coordinated care is the “care conference” in which physicians and specialist teams outline treatment protocols for patients so that care is appropriate and complete – and so that treatment and diagnostic options are not duplicated.
A second key to the coordinated care is a new electronic medical record (EMR) system – Impac Mosaiq – that is especially designed for cancer programs and is compatible with Saint Joseph’s new Epic electronic record system used throughout the rest of the hospital.
With the use of the EMR, all patient care is documented electronically, and all caregivers have access to patient information in real time. “With our EMR,” Carey says, “you’re not waiting on dictation and faxing reports and waiting on lab work.” The EMR also generates regular and timely reports to the patient’s primary care physician. “Primary care physicians will know at any point during the patient’s care exactly what is going on,” according to Carey.
Because of both the EMR and the integration of the care team, including the psychologists and social workers, referring physicians don’t have to be concerned that their patients may “fall through cracks,” says Carey. “You don’t have to worry that your patient’s going to be calling you, saying ‘I have no idea how I’m going to pay these bills. And I have these transportation needs that they don’t seem to be able to help me with.’”
To read the remainder of this article, please continue to: http://denver.yourhub.com/Denver/Stories/News/General-News/Story~677430.aspx
Melissa Speer has spent more than 25 years learning the business of health care and is an expert in EMR implementation. Ms Speer is presently the Director of EMR for The West Clinic, Memphis, TN. This video of Ms. Speers was recorded at the Impac Medical Oncology Users Summit in 2006. She provides tips on how she and her team set the stage for a successful implementation of an EMR.
Read more on Implementation of an EMR
MOSAIQ ROI
Suzanne Marshall, EdM.,RN, Impac Software, Medical Oncology Business Marketing Manager.
Impac Software announced its collaboration with the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) to license NCCN’s clinical care content to clinicians utilizing MOSAIQ®, Impac’s oncology electronic medical record (EMR).
MOSAIQ will be the first oncology EMR to embed an intelligent search engine that dynamically links to the NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology™. The NCCN Guidelines are used by clinicians to shape care recommendations covering 97 percent of all patients with cancer and are updated on a continual basis. The NCCN Guidelines, developed through an explicit review of evidence and recommendations from medical experts, address cancer detection, prevention and risk reduction, workup and diagnosis and treatment and supportive care.
In addition, MOSAIQ also will provide active access to the NCCN Drugs & Biologics Compendium™, which delineates uses of drugs and biologics in the care of patients with cancer, listing FDA-approved disease indications as well as off-label recommendations for use, and to the NCCN Chemotherapy Order Templates™.
“NCCN is looking forward to working with Impac Software to provide another important channel for distribution of the NCCN Guidelines,” says William T. McGivney, PhD, NCCN Chief Executive Officer. “As a result, clinicians will be provided with ready access to the best possible treatment options to improve outcomes for all patients with cancer.”
“Simplified, real-time access to NCCN’s evidence-based clinical content is expected to enhance the delivery of standardized care and improve patient safety,” says Joel Goldwein, M.D., Vice President of Medical Affairs for The Elekta Group. “Many of Impac’s customers are NCCN Member Institutions; however simplifying access to NCCN’s clinical content will significantly increase the use of NCCN Guidelines throughout Impac Software’s existing customer base, and in hundreds of cancer care centers.”
In an effort to standardize care plans, dosages, treatments and processes to control error risk and cost, Iowa Blood and Cancer Care (IBACC), an 16-chair medical oncology treatment center located in Cedar Rapids (Iowa, USA), implemented Impac Software. Enabling physicians to work off the same template and ensure all drugs are mixed and administered consistently, IBACC has been able to prove efficiencies to insurance companies and negotiate better contracts.
Since its founding in June 2001, the center has grown to incorporate a PET CT, lab and pharmacy. Its team of five physicians, four nurse practitioners and 36 staff members daily sees an average of 100-120 patients.
Iowa Blood & Cancer Care, P.L.C.
“Our mission is to bring hope to life, which philosophically to us means a very patient-focused system that fosters hope and healing in each person,” says Sylvia Anspach, Advanced Practice Nurse at IBACC. “We maintain that philosophy not only as a clinical entity, but as a business as well. If we do what is right for the patient, first and foremost, all else will follow. As a result, all decisions are made with the patient at the center.”
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