Improving Care by Improving Efficiency

The current health care reform efforts include vastly increased use of EMR's. Will your current technology infrastructure measure up as the bar is raised? How will outcomes compare to your peers as the use of technology increases?

Study after study touts the increase in patient safety and revenue from the implementation of electronic medical records. And yet the healthcare industry continues to lag woefully behind other industries in the use of information technology. This likely stems in part from the average healthcare organization spending 2 percent of gross revenue on IT expenditures. At the same time, industries such as finance spend upwards of 10 percent.

What is an EMR exactly?
Linda Kloss, executive vice president and CEO at the American Health Information Management Association, states an EMR must provide the following functionality:

• Capture data at the point of care
• Integrate data from multiple internal and external sources
• Support caregiver decision making

The Arkansas Children's Hospital IT Advisory Group defines it as, "the systematic documentation of a patient's medical history and care entirely in digital format." This group defines four key components: results review, order entry, documentation of care and care management. Results review should include not only the obvious, such as lab results, but also care plans and problem lists. Care management should include a summary of all of the other components in order to support decision making.

It is important to recognize that simply scanning paper documents is a step toward an EMR but is not a true EMR. A true EMR is a complete patient record whereby all of the information is created in a digital format. Thus, an up-to-date and complete patient record is available to the entire medical team at all times.

Does your team have constant access to a complete, up-to-date medical record? Can your technology platform automatically update the patient record with information from both internal and external sources? In the very near future it will have to if your organization is to prosper and thrive.

Tremendous opportunities exist for the home care and hospice industries. Now is the time to ensure your technology platform will support higher standards and growth.

A True EMR

Thornberry Ltd is pleased to announce the availability of a true EMR designed for home care and hospice. It is built around Thornberry's core competency of connected care. The company currently is integrating the final functionality to create a true EMR. To learn more about how your organization will benefit from a paperless, automated and complete patient record call 717.283.0980 or email Thornberry.