[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rL7RQzBUMrM[/youtube]
UNM hospitals based out of Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA lost medical records of 1 Lakh patients due to a fire in a warehouse complex. This was the warehouse where they had stored the records. This only goes to show how vulnerable hospitals are to such losses in the absence of a proper records management solution. Get smart. Get a good EDMS solution. Contact us on sales@rincon.co.in or call us on +91 22 61461616
Most of us believe that our medical and other health related information is private and is protected. As an individual we supposedly can decide who can look at and receive the information like our insurers, employers or any other government health care agency. In India even though there is no clear rule / law which states what information can be shared in the public domain. The Privacy Bill, 2011 could be the initial step from the government on implementing some privacy act. Here is the news article that appeared in The Deccan Herald.
Getting this rule implemented calls the hospitals to review the existing security measures followed in safe guarding the patients’ health information. In short your health information shall be protected in a way that does not interfere with your health care. The health information cannot be shared without your written permission unless the law allows it but it is also necessary to keep a complete audit trail who has accessed the same to avoid any misuse. To view the analysis of the Privacy bill click here
A major telecom company warehouse in India had outsourced the storage and scanning of its Consumer Application Forms (CAFs) from 1996 onwards. This warehouse unfortunately caught fire in February this year. After this event, it was found that only 8 million forms had been scanned whereas 12 million unscanned forms had been destroyed. This was a major lapse. The incident not only highlighted the fact that important data had been lost completely, but also underscored the slow rate at which the digitisation of subscriber data was being carried out. Following this incident, the telecom service providers have been asked to ensure quick and time bound scanning of all CAFs, proper duplication of records with a mirror image in the archives, storage of the CAFs to have fireproof arrangements and secure from other hazards. (Refer to the news link http://bit.ly/hDH2MC and http://bit.ly/kh8MVP) Just ponder over the loss of imformation and the lack of records!! This would not have happened if all the documents were digitised regularly and stored in a good document management system.
Security of documents isn’t just about access. You have to ensure that your documents do not get misplaced, lost or damaged. Who hasn’t looked for hours through file cabinets to find the document(s) needed? Sometimes documents are misfiled; other times they are left on someone’s desk or the worst case scenario it could be lost due to pest attack or some natural calamities like flood, fire etc. Many people believe storing documents on their computer or on the company network is considered a form of document management. If the files stored in computer are not backed up and something were to happen to the hard drive, all information is lost. A true document management system ensures that your organization’s information is protected at all times, from natural disaster, catastrophe and corruption.
With a document management system, gone are the days of lost documents because they are all in a secure central electronic repository. Also gone are the days of wasted time because multiple people can retrieve documents from various locations and multiple file cabinets. With a document management system, the documents are immediately retrieved for the person looking for information. This not only makes them more productive for that one task, it shifts the focus from the document retrieval to solving the original issue. A good document management system’s aim is to provide everything you need to help your business run more efficiently, ensuring that you do not waste any unnecessary time and space maintaining your documents. It should also enable businesses to easily share and collaborate on documents in an efficient and productive way. A digital document management system is a great way to save time and take the first steps towards a paperless office.
Along with convenient document sharing and data protection, businesses can take advantage of full audit control, reduced storage requirements, put an end to photocopying / misplaced / lost documents. Meeting regulatory requirements such as HIPAA, SEC and FINRA can be a headache. If you use an EDM, many of the regulatory requirements are built right in, helping you become compliant. No matter what your organization does, you find yourself liable to maintain documents. A document management solution secures the documents that are critical to your business so you can remain accountable to your clients.
Contributed by Ashish Baby
An Electronic Document management solution (EDMS) is a clear winner as a solution for challenges hospitals face when handling medical records. We are highlighting the top 5 reasons why any hospital should opt for an EDMS:
A few small lapses in levels of customer service may not be too detrimental. But when the hospital’s medical record management policy (or lack of it) leads to a serious strategic or tactical error, it could result in the hospital’s reputation being seriously tarnished. This can jeopardize the hospital’s position in the market in the long term and have a cascading effect on other areas of operation.
To help manage the barrage of paper and medical records associated with patients, vendors etc. investing in a good EDMS software is the best option which could integrate with the existing software including the HIMS system in place. The last thing you want to do with your new document management system is spend precious staff time doing backfile conversion. Leave that to the professionals and focus on your business.
Contributed by Ashish Baby
Clear documentation of every single transaction, process and action that takes place will allow you to have a clear reference point whenever anything is questioned. Medical Records are an important document meant basically for recording the treatment procedure meant for a patient. It is important both for the patient as well as for the doctor. It is important for doctors to realise that Medical Records have become the single most effective weapon in their hands to counter the claims of the patients, when they file a case for compensation. The law is very clear regarding the Medical Records and the value of it. The law requires proper maintenance of case sheets since they are the most important document that can be used in medico legal cases. In some cases these documents may serve as effective alibi for the patients too.
Medical Records can help prove the innocence of the doctors concerned and under medical ethics, the case report is supposed to be given to the patient on demand. Accusation of malpractices and unethical codes of conduct can be made against the concerned doctor / consultant if he / she fails to provide the patient with all the details and the case sheets of his admission, operation and the postoperative medication along with the dosage. It is an important aspect of the written evidence. It is strictly confidential document & should be produced as and when asked by the law. Medical records are medico-legal documents and a doctor can be cross-examined against the same. The patient also has the right to get his medical records and cannot be denied the same when he has paid the doctor / hospital for his treatment and hired their services. Not maintaining a proper record amounts to deficiency in service.
Medical Records are the backbone of any medical institution. With advancement in technology maintenance of medical records has become much easier and more efficient. Records and documents properly kept can become defence shields for the doctors / hospital in the court of law and is a good DMS Solution is highly recommended in hospital / clinics.
Contributed by Ashish Baby
We participated in the recently held Medrecon 2011 conference in Hyderabad. This is an annual national conference on Medical Records. With a view to increase our reach in the Indian market particularly for the Medical records department in the India’s leading hospitals, along with our technology partner e-bizindia participated in the event organized by Kamineni Hospitals. This event provided an opportunity for the health record professionals to enrich their knowledge, skills, technology and get updated with the latest trends in health records management. It was a unique platform to interact with each other to enhance efficiency, accuracy and get updated on the technological advancements related to medical records and health information management. There were more than 300 participants from various healthcare fields like Doctors, Medical Records Professionals, Health care Administrators, Medico-legal experts, I.T professionals from the field of Hospital information management and Document Management Software side. It was great experience meeting the experts and understanding current processes, practical challenges in deploying solutions and know the future scope of EDMS solution in the healthcare segment.
During the event scientific papers on various following topics were presented by delegates and sponsors. To name few which attracted my interest was
As part of our participation, we had a booth where delegates could walk in and see our solution and engage in discussions. They walked away with information and a chart were they could record information pertaining to the medical records they handled. We also got an opportunity to present our solution on the need to digitization of paper based medical records and the importance of integrating an EDMS solution with HIS, HMIS, EMR, EHR and other applications in the organisation. During one of the panel discussions, there was a discussion on the need to work towards standardizing curriculum for Medical Record Professional. One of the delegates suggested having online examinations for Medical Record professionals which I felt was a very valid point in today’s times.
Contributed by Harshad Thakkar
Patient data confidentiality and internal data security at hospitals will continue to be at risk if proper care is not taken while transferring data from paper form to the digital format. All good hospitals wish to leverage the growing power of information technology in the health care industry so that the quality of care and efficiency benefits that come with computerization are utilised for improving the overall patient experience.
The latest market research report by Global Industry Analysts (GIA) on Electronic Medical Records (EMR) shows that EMR systems are widely accepted in the health care industry worldwide. Hospitals now have a system for effective management of data, less costs, minimum staff and improving the quality of care. The paradigm predicts that patients will become the decision makers in future health care interactions and most importantly, patients will own their own health data, rather than it being owned and contained by health care institutions and professionals. If this trends grows, there is a possibility that people will start building communities and share their experience. This enables patients to understand a great deal about their health and any illnesses they experience and improve the quality of their lives thereby. Doctors also feel that EMR will help them to maintain high-level of quality patient care while keeping ahead of the curve as a state-of-the-art hospital/clinic. EMR for various specialities is also an emerging trend and oncology is the first to start with.
Contributed by Ashish Baby
Further to the post on what is an EDMS, we would like to also highlight what one needs to look at when selecting an EDMS for any organisation.
You will find a lot of EDMS applications available in the market today. These could range from simple applications that come bundled with scanners to software organisations. While every software has a claim on having the perfect match for your requirement, it is important that you take some simple steps that will help you arrive at the best match for your requirement thus reducing frustration.
Have a clear understanding of how paper is used, stored, retrieved within your organisation. How does the document originate, what is the process and what is the content that is involved? You could also involve other members of your organisation thus forming a task force that will go through different departments and come up with a detailed list of requirements. Alternatively you could also call in experts or vendors who will do this task for you. Based on your collected requirements, form a consolidated list of requirements which will aid your decision making process. You also need to come up with evaluation criteria so that you know the requirements which are “must haves” and those which are “good to have”.
During the evaluation, keep in mind the evaluation criteria and also keep in mind the flexibility of the software to scale up in case you decide to start at a departmental or workgroup level and later on ramp up to an enterprise wide deployment.
Remember, selecting the right system can transform your business and simplify the way it is done.
With contributions from Ashish Baby and Harshad Thakkar
An ideal office is one which is clutter free and neat and clean. But how often do we see piles of paper on tables? Very often indeed. While we may try and store the important documents neatly, it means using expensive real estate to store these documents. And retrieving a particular document is a tall order. It calls for going through multiple files and multiple pages… Almost like finding a needle in a haystack. According to Gartner Research, on an average it takes 18 minutes to search for a document. Not only that, they also have found that on an average professionals spend 50% of their time looking for information.
So how does one over come this challenge? The answer is an Electronic Document Management System (EDMS). EDMS can change the way in which your business functions. Whether you are looking for a simple method to improve the way you handle important paper based documents or handling electronic files generated by users on their computer systems, an EDMS is able to provide various advantages for organisations of all sizes.
What does an EDMS entail?
Capturing – Using a good scanner, the first step is to transform the paper based documents also called hard copies into electronic format. There are software plug-ins that can help improve the quality of the scanned images (noise reduction) and can also turn upside down images which are scanned in the wrong direction.
Indexing – Once you have tens of thousands of documents scanned into the computer, tracking them and keeping them organised is the next challenge. Index fields or unique identifiers for each document or a group of documents shall be entered which will help in classification. This in turn saves precious time.
Retrieval – EDMS makes the entire process of retrieving the required documents very simple. One can enter the keyword search and the system will bring up one or more documents that match the criteria in a very short span of time. It is also possible to use a combination of keywords or even using Boolean method of searching.
With contributions from Ashish Baby and Harshad Thakkar