[#18922] Dispatch Turnaround Time Analysis module
Now you can easily view, compare, and analyze the turnaround time of your facilities. We have created a new module, where you can filter the list of exams by referring facility and see turnaround time for each exam as well as average time for the selected date range. To access it, go to the Analysis module and select Dispatch Turnaround Time Analysis in the dropdown menu.
[#18758] Set the modalities to be displayed in AMI viewer
There are two image viewers available in EMSOW. Some of our customers prefer to view images of particular modalities on EMSOW viewer, instead of AMI viewer. Now you can customize AMI viewer on your EMSOW domain by choosing the modalities to be displayed in it. To apply this option, please contact our support at support@emsow.com.
[#16984] Create documents based on templates
Besides file uploading and paperwork scanning, you can now use templates to create documents in EMSOW! Click the “Documents” button and then click “Add using templates” to create a new document:
This functionality is available in the Processing and Dispatch modules, as well as the Rendering Provider and Technologist portals. To set up document templates, administrators should go to Setup → Reading → Report Templates.
[#18431] Billing charges for multiple billing companies
Now you can specify more than one billing company in one billing charge record, instead of creating a separate record for each of your billing companies. Go to Setup → Billing → Billing Charges, create or edit a record for a CPT code, and use the “Billing companies” drop-down list:
We asked our customers to choose the top 5 features for the last month. Here they come…
#1 Rendering Provider portal
Here, you can create studies in order to save the results of your work with patients. You can also add notes to the studies based on customizable templates. User-friendly search filters allow you to filter the studies by any criteria, from the date of service to the patient’s or doctor’s name.
#2 New “Enterprise administrator” user group
We have added a new user group called Enterprise administrator. This group provides extended user rights and can be assigned to advanced EMSOW users who wish to set up and fine-tune EMSOW to meet their own needs and bring the highest level of efficiency to their system.
#3 Technologists can clock in and out via web browser
To enable this functionality, an enterprise administrator should click “Admin” → “Terminals” and create a new terminal record with the “Kiosk technologist time tracking module” option. Then your technologists will be able to go to your domain and check in. After they are done working, the technologists should go to the same address and check out.
#4 Copy diagnoses in Service Edit window
Save the time you spend on entering the same diagnoses for several studies. Make a single click, and the system will automatically copy all the diagnoses to the rest of the studies, if their Diagnosis fields are empty.
#5 Copy address from “Nursing home” type referring facilities
We have increased the automation of data entry. Now you can copy the address of a referring facility to service records if the referring facility is a nursing home.
If you want to learn more about our updates or services, please feel free to contact us at connect@unvsoft.com.
We have already mentioned problems arising from double data entry. The main issues are time expenditures and high risk of human error, as well as the need for duplicating and synchronizing databases, which may be a costly affair. In one of our previous articles, we discussed how DICOM Modality Worklist can help to transfer patient information from a scheduling or dispatching system to a diagnostic machine. However, the connection between your scheduling service and diagnostic equipment is just a single link in your IT infrastructure. This time we will look at the situation through a broader lens and talk about how integrated healthcare solutions can help to eliminate the problem completely.
Let’s suppose you run a diagnostic imaging business, and you do it in a rather conservative way. Then your workflow is probably similar to the following.
First, you obtain patients’ information: demographics (age, sex, etc.), required studies, date and time of service, the referring doctor’s name, and then you pass this information to scheduling or dispatching software, where study orders are created. At this stage, you are likely to enter data manually, which is quite common.
Then you need to pass these orders to the diagnostic equipment of various modalities (X-ray, ultrasound, etc.). If you are using Modality Worklist, which is correctly configured, the data will be transmitted flawlessly. Otherwise, imaging technologists will have to re-enter all the patient information manually, which may lead to additional errors and affect the quality of their work (we should bear in mind that medical imaging is a very technologist-dependent industry).
When the studies are completed, images are sent to a PACS. There are several reasons for using web-based PACS, you might have read about them on our blog. The images include patient information for identification in the PACS.
The next stage is reading, or image interpretation. The images are passed to a RIS (Radiology Information System), where the reading doctor analyzes them and creates a report on each study.
Having finalized the reports, the reading doctor sends them to a Health Information System (HIS). Depending on the degree of HIS integration into your IT infrastructure, the patient data may be sent automatically or entered manually once again (it has been already entered twice, so this is the third time).
After that, the reports can be received by the referring physician.
That’s what it looks like. You may have gotten used to this workflow, but even if all of your sonographers and technologists are flawless in data entry and never make mistakes, you would probably agree that this workflow lacks efficiency. You may hire the most skilled medical specialists, and still steadily lose revenue just because their skills are underused.
Your business may employ multiple standalone services and still suffer from mistakes arising from the data re-entry. The primary cause is the lack of integration of all these tools.
If you are thinking about streamlining your workflow, then full-featured software might be of interest to you. It may be designed as a module-based application. Such software applications put together all the stages of your workflow and offer multiple advantages – and minimizing data re-entries is just one of them. Once you have entered the patient’s information, it will be transmitted to the following stages or just stored in the system, so that you could quickly retrieve it at any time.
If your PACS server is integrated with a HIS/RIS system, scheduling service, and appropriately configured diagnostic equipment, it is possible to transfer patient demographics directly from patient records. Then your sonographers and X-ray technologists will not have to re-enter any patient data on their machines.
[#18822] Technologists can clock in and out via web browser
To enable this functionality, an enterprise administrator should click “Admin” → “Terminals” and create a new terminal record with the “Kiosk technologist time tracking module” option. Then your technologists (i.e. users with a technologist link) will be able to go to <yourdomain>.emsow.com/kiosk and check in at referring facilities that they are visiting to work with patients. After they are done working, the technologists should go to the same address and check out.
To track working hours of your technologists, go to “Accounting” → “Technologists Time Tracking.”
