Physical Therapy Documentation & Medical Billing INTOUCHEMR

Health Care Management at Its Best

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Mar 7, 2019 | Healthcare Practice Management, Physical Therapy Documentation, Physical Therapy Management

Producing reports for health care management in order to monitor efficiency of therapists and staff are now possible.

Nitin Chhoda explains how physical therapy EMR changes the productivity and efficiency of physical therapy practice by reviewing the number of patients who have been treated during a certain period of time.

With an incredible array of technological tools at the ready, there is no reason why health care practice management can’t undergo a renaissance.

In a small practice, the office manager can also serve as patient relations, interpersonal coach, HR manager, and accountant.

But with electronic medical records, the health care manager may become the financial analyst as well. In fact, analyzing efficiency, strengths, and weaknesses of the practice may be the top priority for the health care management field.

How Reporting Improves Efficiency

Both internally and with patients, an EMR can improve efficiency just by virtue of eliminating the majority of paperwork. Communication is streamlined and things like medical billing and coding can be handled more quickly and with fewer mistakes. But for health care management, EMRs are introducing tools that change the way we think about managing a practice.

An EMR with reporting capabilities can tell health care management professionals a lot about how the practice is doing. Outcomes and performance of clinicians and patients can be compared with a few clicks.

In the past, it would have been almost insurmountable to extract data on visits per referral and visits per day for each clinician. With the new practice management technology, those reports can be run quickly and simply.

In fact, there are a whole host of important indicators that are being monitored by the software solutions designed for health care management. Most of these indicators can help office managers to see where the lags in efficiency are hiding.

Inefficiencies degrease profitability, and decreased profitability is bad for everyone. The information gathered can be shared with staff members and solutions can be discussed with health care management.

If used appropriately, technological management tools can help turn a practice that is just getting by into a profitable enterprise. From changing the way that medical billing is handled to using proven techniques to speed up recovery and improve outcomes, health care management tools are going to go a long way towards revolutionizing the business side of medicine.

Educational Experience

With an increased emphasis on technology, more and more individuals who want to pursue a career in health care management are going back to school.

The job has no educational requirements, but a bachelor’s degree and even a master’s degree are not uncommon.

There are specific programs now that will education students about the pitfalls and advantages available to adaptable health care management.

As the job market widens, these are the professionals that will be handling health care management jobs. And because the role of health care management professionals is changing so quickly, there is a lot of room for improvement in most health care practices.

The office manager has the job of ensuring that things run smoothly and if there are problems, the office manager needs to work with staff to find solutions. A health care management professional who understands the benefits of current technology will have more tools for finding solutions than ever before.

Medical Billing And Coding Outsourced

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Feb 17, 2019 | Medical Billing, Physical Therapy Billing, Physical Therapy Documentation, Physical Therapy Software

Medical billing and coding are indeed a very complex subject. It is important to analyze whether your practice will need an in-house medical biller and coder or have it outsourced.

Nitin Chhoda gives some factors to consider in order to guide your physical therapy practice when it comes to your medical billing needs.

Outsourcing often increases efficiency, especially in technical fields like accounting and medical billing and coding.

Within a single office, a number of practices can be serviced by a handful of highly skilled professional medical billers and coders.

They can focus all of their resources and attention on efficiency and a system that works. At a medical clinic, the primary focus is often the patients, as it should be.

Reasons to Outsource Your Medical Billing and Coding

Here are some very good reasons that a practice should consider outsourcing medical billing and coding. For the most part, the decision will be financial. But to determine whether or not it will be worthwhile for your practice to outsource can be so complex that identifying key reasons to outsource will help.

You’re New

New clinicians or health care providers have a whole host of things to worry about. How do you maintain a steady stream of patients?

Does your practice have the in-house testing capabilities necessary for the needs of the community? How do you balance the business side with patient care? How many hours per day should you be seeing patients?

Probably the top concern is how your patients are doing, how they feel about you, and whether or not you’re helping them. Managing a business at the same time as you’re learning what it means to run a private practice can be overwhelming.

Staff Turnover is High

If you are handling in-house medical billing and coding, but have to hire a new biller or coder regularly, your practice will suffer.

The learning curve for medical billing and coding is unforgiving and even a skilled medical billing and coding professional is going to be slow to start as they figure out your particular system. For practices that can’t seem to keep medical billing and coding staff members, a consistent service from elsewhere will be more efficient.

Inefficiency is Obvious

Outsourcing has a couple of major benefits, and one of them is that rejections and denials are usually decreased when you outsource medical billing and coding.

If you are experiencing problems with collections and your rejection and denial rate is high, it may be time to consider giving the job to a service that specializes in getting claims accepted.

You Don’t Want to Focus on Billing

Chances are, you don’t want to think about medical billing and coding. As critical as getting paid is to the health of your practice, if you became a doctor because you want to help people feel better, billing is probably an annoying part of your job.

Not to mention the fact that an incredible amount of tech savvy and skill is required to make your medical billing and coding system efficient and effective. Many clinicians decide that the billing side is the part they don’t want to know about – they’d prefer to let someone else worry about the medical billing and coding courses so they can continue to provide a service to the community.

Physical Therapy EMR Checklist For Your Practice

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Feb 10, 2019 | Electronic Medical Records, Physical Therapy Documentation

You have made the decision to convert your documentation into a physical therapy EMR software, now what? How can you be sure that you’re getting the best product at the best price, and one that will help maximize your documentation process?

Nitin Choda provides you with a checklist that outlines key areas you will need to consider in order to choose the best and the right software for your practice.

Physical therapy electronic medical records solution is sometimes hard to find. The same is true when picking a restaurant to eat at. We need help in finding the right product.

If you are feeling a little lost and confused by all the options available for a physical therapy EMR products, don’t worry: picking a good solution isn’t as hard as it might seem.

Just keep your eye on the goal, and your hands on this checklist.

Find a decent price. Price is important. A lower price doesn’t always mean a worse product, and a low price also means you will have more money in your bank for other things. Try to find the cheapest physical therapy EMR that you are comfortable with, and that does everything you need, but not at the expense of inefficiency.

Does it fulfill your needs? Physical therapy EMR has different requirements from other electronic medical records. After all, you are dealing with physical activities more often than drug dosages. Look for a product that makes documentation simple because much of what you will be doing is documentation.

You need to make sure that the physical therapy EMR you picked is actually capable of doing what you need it to do. That means getting your hands on a copy and simulating the activities you would do throughout the day. If you find that part of your process has been left out by the solution, well, you know it isn’t for you.

Is billing integrated? This might seem like a minor thing, but keeping billing integrated with patient information is the best possible way to ensure that you handle billing as efficiently as possible.

Billing is never fun, but you shouldn’t have to keep an extra database just to deal with it. Make sure that physical therapy EMR billing is integrated with your documentation software. And you will be glad you did.

Can you document your patients quickly? The fewer clicks, the better. How quickly can you document what is happening with your patient? The tool should be capable of handling rapid note taking.

It should be able to handle you recording your every observation, and archive those observations in a way that you can get to quickly. In short, your physical therapy EMR solution should be ready to handle your patient load.

Can you schedule new appointments easily? Appointments are the bread and butter of your practice. Without them, there would be no physical therapy. You won’t even need to use your physical therapy EMR tools. Make sure that your tool is prepared to schedule and manage appointments.

What does your staff think? Let your staff try out the physical therapy EMR software. If they don’t like it, or they can’t use it, then it doesn’t matter how many features it has. A piece of software is only as good as its user interface, especially when it comes to something used every single day.

Is it mobile? Physical therapy involves moving around. You shouldn’t be constrained to a desktop computer when using a physical therapy EMR solution. It should support iPads, so you can carry a single, lightweight computer with you at all times, documenting everything as it happens in real time.

Electronic Medical Records System Top Five Benefits

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Feb 3, 2019 | Electronic Medical Records, Physical Therapy Documentation

There are many benefits that an electronic medical record system can give. In this article, Nitin Chhoda emphasizes on the top five most important benefits that EMR can provide so that practitioners who have not adopt the EMR system yet will understand its importance.

Electronic medical records are the next big thing in physical therapy management.

When EMR systems are fully adopted by all facilities, you are going to see a major change in how medicine is practiced.

Here are the top five benefits of using an electronic medical records system if you are a physical therapist.

BENEFITS OF ELECTRONIC MEDICAL RECORDS

Easy Access to Records. With electronic medical records, keeping track of your patients’ records is simple. Your database should be easily searchable, so you can instantly pull up all the information you have on the patient from exercise and appointment schedules to the medications they are taking.

That means no paper records to flip through, the ability to instantly search the documents for information, and no unintelligible hand-written notes. Electronic medical records is really the ultimate physical therapy management solution.

Document Completely. With electronic medical records, you can easily document everything that a patient does in real time. From arrival to billing to the appointment itself, all information can be listed in the database to give you a complete record of everything about the patient.

And, because of the easy access to records, all that information is immediately available on the database to anyone who might need access.

Send Records Easily. Sending electronic medical records using your physical therapy management software should streamline inter-office communications. Most EMR solutions integrate seamlessly with online cloud storage, and through these cloud storage solutions you can get the records to any other healthcare provider that the patient is working with.

It doesn’t even matter if the other facility has fully integrated electronic medical records for physical therapy services. You can still access the files as long as you have a computer connected to the internet. Relying on physical therapy management software with full EMR will help bring physical therapy into the next century, ridding practices of outdated technology and wasted energy and effort.

Easy Billing. Physical therapy billing can be a pain. As with all forms of accounting, keeping the information synced to the patient is difficult. Electronic medical records and physical therapy documentation can make the process far more comfortable.

With physical therapy scheduling software, you can time alerts for when your patients are coming, keep track how much they owe, how long it took for them to pay last time, and where to send the bill.

Physical therapy software makes billing patients an incredibly simple procedure and reduces the chance of mistakes.

No Chicken Scratches. This might be the most important one. In the medical profession, a remarkable number of doctors have terrible handwriting.

An electronic medical records solution means no chicken scratches.

All information is entered in on a computer screen, whether it is an iPad for a mobile solution or a desktop office computer for a more stationary one. That means that all the information is nicely organized, printed cleanly, and is easy to understand.In other words: you won’t have to worry about others not being able to read your handwriting.

Electronic Medical Records System Streamlines PT Management

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Jan 5, 2019 | Electronic Medical Records, Physical Therapy Documentation, Physical Therapy Software

Nitin Chhoda shows how physical therapy businesses through the use of electronic medical records, can streamline their practice and drastically improve their productivity and cash flow with relative ease.

More and more hospitals and doctors’ offices are storing patient data using electronic medical records, which has allowed physical therapy management and patient care to become more streamlined, productive and profitable for the medical practice itself.

Improve Efficiency

As the field of medicine continues to get competitive, having the ability to cut costs and improve efficiency are keys to the overall success of a medical practice.

Physical therapy management is now able to implement the benefits of utilizing electronic medical records through their business.

Some of the benefits include:

Having the ability to identify where unknown problems have crept into office procedures. Physical therapy billing is quite complex. By using electronic medical records to do the work for you, the chance of errors occurring is considerably lowered, which allows the practice to process payments much faster resulting in more cash flow.

Electronic medical records place a wide range of data at a therapist’s fingertips to evaluate physical therapy management staffing needs and deploy clinicians where they’re most effective.

Paperwork is destined to become obsolete with electronic medical records that store documents digitally. This will increase productivity and customer service because all medical information is easily accessible

The Future

Electronic medical records are revolutionizing medical treatment by putting critical decision support systems in the hands of skilled healthcare professionals, giving them the information they need to make timely decisions.

The future of healthcare will continually keep getting better with the intelligent application of electronic medical records technology, a patient-centered focus and a dedication of skilled medical professionals.

Electronic Medical Records – How to Implement?

by Nitin Chhoda PT, DPT | Dec 9, 2018 | Electronic Medical Records, Physical Therapy Documentation, Physical Therapy Software

Although switching to EMR will make the documentation process better, there are some factors that need to be considered before expecting a smooth transition.

Nitin Chhoda points out that open communication with staff before, during, and after implemenation is important. He will discuss how and why managing your staff’s expectations is crucial, and how to handle any rough patches during the change over process.

Electronic medical records are sometimes feared by clinicians and medical managers because of wrong implementation that may not actually improve the business and remain stagnant instead.

Implementation is going to be the toughest time, as everyone will probably be adjusting their workflow and accomplishing tasks more slowly than before.

But this shouldn’t discourage you from making the necessary changes. You will learn a lot through implementation of your electronic medical records and you can use that to your advantage.

Before Implementation

The best way to ensure that implementing electronic medical records goes smoothly for your practice is to plan and prepare beforehand. You should have a time leading up to implementation when all staff members can give input, voice concerns, and get the training they will need.

Remember this phrase: managing expectations.

If your staff expects the process to be difficult and frustrating, but things go smoothly, you will find that electronic medical records implementation will be easier. But if you try to convince the staff that it will be simple and straightforward, any problems will seem larger than they are in the grand scheme of things.

Make a plan, set goals, get buy-in and feedback, and give your staff the training they will need. Implementation will be a completely different experience if you prepare for the physical therapy electronic medical records implementation process.

When You Hit Tough Patches

There will be rough spots. Accept that now and you are halfway to dealing with them. The same is true for your staff’s attitude towards difficulties.

Let them know that you expect it to take a bit of time in implementing electronic medical records system before everyone has adjusted and that you want them to deal with problems rather than brush over them.

Problems that arise will educate you on how to improve the system to meet the needs of staff. Use each problem as if it is an opportunity. Talk to staff and the software developers so changes can be made right from the start.

Others Have Been There Before

Another important thing to remember is that you aren’t the first practice to implement physical therapy software for electronic medical records management. There are incredible resources out there that can help you along the way. From choosing the right physical therapy EMR to dealing with issues during EMR implementation, you can find resources online.

Electronic medical records system implementation could present some struggles for you and your staff. But those struggles don’t have to be disasters.

Makes sure that you and your staff have access to training materials and resources and that everyone is encouraged to ask questions. If you can manage the expectations of the staff, ensure that they are on board even before electronic medical records implementation starts, and give them support during the process, things will go more smoothly.

Electronic medical records of physical therapy software has been improving, but that doesn’t mean the prefect fit has been established. Another critical part of ensuring that implementation goes well is that you choose the right software. Take your time and do the research to determine what will work best for your practice.