About the Author

Sheldon Needle is President of CTSGUIDES.COM, a free web site offering reviews, ratings, tools, and expert advice to help companies select software. Sheldon is a former CFO, consultant and software designer who has published more than 20 guides on software selection.

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EMR software, medical billing software, and medical practice management software are not the same. Buying more than what you need can be very costly for a medical practice.

Large Practice
If you run a large medical practice or health-related organization, you probably have to meet many regulatory rules, provide scheduling at multiple locations and manage different coding requirements for Medicare.  In that case you should be evaluate a medical practice management software that covers both an electronic medical records or EMR and medical billing.

A good medical software package that handles all of these function – can be used to full advantage by a well trained staff, and  can improve your bottom line.

Small Practice
But what about a small medical practice  — how much medical software do you really need?  The answer may be – at least for the short term – very little.  What a small practice really needs is medical billing software – and a good stand-alone package will do. Here is why:

• If your practice is small, you do not need all the bells and whistles of medical practice management software, but you do need the medical billing function. Full-featured medical practice management software may have many more features than you need, and can use effectively. There’s a risk that you’ll pay too much and it’ll be underutilized.
• Performing in-house medical practice billing without decent software can cripple the medical billing process for your practice. Since denial of claims by insurance companies, Medicare, and other health care payers are common.  It’s critical that you have the ability to submit and update claims electronically and check for viable codes.  Without it, you can create an unending traffic jam in your bill processing which can affect your cash flow.
• Unless you outsource to an inexpensive medical billing service, you’ll pay top dollar – and middleman service charges – for something that a small scale medical billing software package can do for you very efficiently.  As a category, Medical billing software is now a pretty mature product.

Do proper due diligence when purchasing a stand-alone medical billing software package.  Most good medical billing software have easy-to-use interfaces and upgrade paths to fully featured EMR software and medical practice management software.

Consider a web-based medical billing software rather than client/server.  As a small practice, it’s much easier to have someone else worry about data security and backups.  Plus you won’t have to make the up-front investment in buying the hardware and the software.

Getting EMR software training for users at all levels – doctors, nurses, pharmacists, medical coding specialists, hospital administrators, etc. can help you get the most out of your medical software investment.

Sometimes, the choice of which EMR system to use is less important than the “change management” and training plan an organization chooses.

Implementing even the best-designed medical practice management software changes the manner of doing business significantly for a medical practice. It can entail a fairly steep learning curve.

Here are some critical training issues to keep in mind:

1. Make sure that everyone who will use the system gets adequate training.  Good training – or lack thereof – can affect the success of the EMR software within your organization. Both clinical and administrative staffs need to be trained to use the same modules since they will need to exchange relevant information.  If the software is underutilized, it can wind up costing you time and money.
2. Try to get everyone on board and positive about your new EMR software.  If key members are grumbling and not committing to learning their parts of the system, the implementation might not go smoothly. Make it fun.
3. Assess everyone’s general computer skills (the younger employees are probably more able than the older employees – even though they are less sophisticated professionally).  If needed, get training to bring everyone up to basic computer skills level – everyone should be comfortable with use of the mouse, basic graphic interface, hierarchical file structures, password use, etc..
4. Develop your training plan to as part of your overall implementation plan. The plan will have to be driven in part by the skills of the staff.  Appreciate that even the most brilliant and senior physicians may need significant ramp-up time to use the system well. Don’t overwhelm users with too much change and detail too soon.
5. Implementation in phases – rather than overnight – is a preferable so employees can learn at their own pace and feel confident about the software. A functional modular approach to training allows change to happen more gradually.  For instance, you may choose to train and implement a medical billing system first before the full EMR is introduced.
6. Practice makes perfect. After training, dedicate time to letting staff practice what they’ve learned.  If you hire an outside company to train, have them on-site post training to answer staff questions and work through problems.

In short, take the long-term view:  if you view your EMR training time as part of your medical practice management software investment, and you plan your training to fit the needs of your particular staff, your migration to EMR is likely to succeed.

According to the National ePrescribing Patient Safety Initiative or NEPSI, prescription errors injure 1.7 million Americans every year, and take 7,000 lives.

If your practice has yet to invest in Medical Practice Management Software or Medical Billing software, you can get still get top of the line e-Prescription (electronic prescription) software for free by signing up with the NEPSI.  The National ePrescribing Patient Safety Initiative is dedicated to helping prevent medical errors caused by prescription errors. The software is based on ePrescribe from Allscripts ™, and is available to physicians for free by Allscripts and the other NEPSI sponsors.

Allscripts e-Prescription software does not have to be used in conjunction with other medical practice software.  It is a stand-alone web-based product.  It is encrypted and contains other safety and security precautions, and thus protects the privacy of doctors, and their patients’ data.  Allscripts ePrescribe™ provides a complete medication database to users, along with clinical decision support and reference material.

Benefits of e-Prescription Software

1. Handwriting mistakes are avoided
2. All prescriptions are checked for drug interactions, allergies, dosing errors, pregnancy related issues, and other related problems
3. Electronic medical record is created based on the patient drug information
4. Comprehensive drug database is maintained and kept up-to-date
5. Prescription refills are easy and fast
6. Communication is improved between doctors and pharmacists
7. Helps doctors and their patients to identify less expensive medication options
8. Provides up-to-date drug coverage insurance information

Allscripts, the medical software company, Dell computers, Microsoft Corp, Sprint Nextel Corp, and SureScripts ™ and a host of other corporate health, medical, and communications-related companies sponsor this initiative across the United States. Allscripts and the other sponsoring vendors do not make money on this offer. They are engendering good will and hopeful that some physicians will try their medical practice software products down the road.  An Allscripts customer service team provides training and support for the product’s use. The Allscripts software is also designed to be interoperable with other vendors’ e-health records software.

You must be a physician in order to register.  Only one physician per practice can register for the program (although more practice members can register later).  Physicians can register on line for this e-prescriptions program at:

https://erxnowregistration.allscripts.com/