WebPT Blog
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5 CommentsApr 15, 2011
As an in-home therapy clinic, Jim Prussack of In-Home Therapy Services (aptly named) had some unique issues he faced with documentation. They were 100% paper-based, using hand-written notes during sessions, with little to no compliance standards in place. In an effort to gain efficiencies and save money, while still allowing his staff to remain mobile, Jim turned to WebPT. The first thing he noticed was how easy it was to get up and running. He was using the system in a few hours, and within a short time, he was able to import all of his past records.
“We were able to get all of our existing records transferred very quickly and without the pain you’d typically expect with this kind of file transfer. All of our PTs and office staff were up and running smoothly on the system, as if it was second nature, in a matter of weeks.”
Jim's Challenges:
- Paper-based
- Hand-written notes with no standards
- Mobile staff, never in the office
Solution and Benefits of WebPT
- Imported existing records easily
- More productive PT practice
- Documentation was cohesive and stored in a secure place.
Since using WebPT, Jim and his team now feel all of the documentation is more compliant and organized. Jim also noted that his office manager has been able to take control of all of the practices’ online information, so each PT doesn’t have to be responsible for managing their own documents. This alone has made everyone’s practice much easier and kept information much more consistent and standardized.
“Having a web-based EMR system that is built just for PTs has been amazing. The capabilities of this system have made everything streamlined and seamless for our entire team. From recording to faxing notes automatically, to processing, the time and energy saved has been tremendous.”
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Apr 15, 2011
WebPT recently added a game-changing feature to our Front Office Suite for scheduling. The appointment reminder service integrates with the WebPT EMR system to automatically look at your physician schedules and notify patients of upcoming appointments via email, phone or text messages.
Imagine the time savings if all of your calls and email were automated vs. having your front office constantly on the phone reminding people of their appointments.
Why bother with appointment reminders?
There are countless case studies on Walgreens, Hilton, Physicians and even Guinness, and McDonalds on how call reminders and SMS text reminders saves thousands of man hours and increases revenue drastically. Provider-specific studies from Johns Hopkins and the University of Rochester show a 30% decrease on patient no-shows. Let’s look at a few other benefits to your clinic:
Benefits of Patient Reminders:
- Reduce patient no-show rate by as much as one third
- Send unique messages based on appointment type
- Supports both email and voice notifications
- Improved arrival times to keep you on schedule
- Automatically update appointment status with call results
- Improved collection processes and revenue stream
- Re-capture lost staff and physician time by automating your client communication
- Better managed patient health
- Elimination of expensive paper-based mailing campaigns
- Secure and compliant patient messaging via the email, LAN and cell phones
- Expanded your clinic hours by scheduling automated messages after-hours and on weekends.
The PT clinic front office staff is already overwhelmed with patient reminders, re-schedules, no shows and phone calls. The Appointment Reminder service can reduce front office workload, while simultaneously increasing the frequency and quality of patient communication. With the recapture of 1 more visit per week, the call reminder service can pay for your entire EMR service with WebPT -- not a bad deal.
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Apr 15, 2011| Heidi Jannenga PT
WebPT EMR Adds a Pediatric-Focused Module
Today, we’re announcing a new feature of WebPT that focuses on Pediatrics…finally! The Pediatric rehab community has been shouting for EMR providers to focus on specialty practices like Peds for a long time. WebPT has answered the call.
Top 10 Benefits of the new Pediatric-focused module:
- A more specific SOAP template
- Pediatric tests loaded right into the system
- Quit working around a too-general EMR
- Ability to work in any environment with Mobile capability
- Comprehensive Pediatrics Objective Tests
- Intuitive patient form based on patient age
- Pediatrics specific billing codes
- Better managed patient health
- Re-capture lost time and resources with streamlined documentation
- Better managed patient health
Our new Pediatrics module will allow Pediatrics providers a new freedom in their therapy documentation. WebPT is the only web-based and mobile capable EMR to offer such a robust documentation template for this specialty discipline.
Some therapists working in Pediatrics prefer to work in the home of the patient with the family involved. Using a web-based system unlocks many previously unattainable possibilities. WebPT integrates with any mobile technology that has a reliable Internet connection. This basic benefit of the system will be indispensible to those Pediatrics providers who visit their patients in their homes.
The WebPT Pediatrics module is meant to empower therapists by providing a form for documentation that was specifically designed with the unique needs of a Pediatric specialist in mind. There will no longer be a need for cumbersome workarounds to make a system designed for other rehab specialties work for Pediatrics. This solution will allow the therapists to focus on what matters most - patient care.
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Apr 14, 2011
Here at WebPT, we are constantly striving to improve efficiency in our PT's daily workflow. If you were to enter our office door, take one big step over Topper, our dog and Chief Morale Officer, and then stroll around our office, you would hear our development team and member reps asking “How can we make WebPT better, while keeping it extremely easy-to-use?”
In order to do this, we engage our therapist community and listen to them closely. One of our latest features is a small change, but it carries big time savings with it. As many of our members have grown their businesses into multi locations, we saw an opportunity to further improve on the “cloud” aspect of the system. We know accessibility is important and our latest feature unveils a new function that will make the transmission of information across many clinic locations easier.
Currently, clinics that have multiple locations within WebPT enter and view information for Payer profiles and Physician profiles specific to each office. In this style, staff at Clinic A would have to enter the exact same information as the staff at Clinic B. It was basically creating duplicate work and records if the patient were to transfer from 1 clinic to another.
Now, clinics with multiple locations will see Payer profiles and Physician profiles available across all locations. This means you can leverage your resources better and improve productivity of the front office staff.
This new company-wide view will result in a shared list of patient’s among all of the clinic locations within your company. Now, WebPT members can easily view patient data, physicians and insurance companies from any location with the appropriate information, allowing clinics to more freely monitor patients across any location in the overall company.
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Apr 12, 2011
1. Google the Company – What is being said and written about the company? User message boards and forums as well as articles often talk about EMR companies both positively and negatively. Look for articles that mention companies who have recently cut their staff or burned through millions of dollars that was raised in financing. Also Google industry keywords (Physical Therapy EMR; PT Software, etc) – companies that show up at or near the top of the list are usually very popular and will get a lot of traffic and thus future customers which will lead to the company’s growth and strength.
2. Focus of the Company – Does the company focus on one specific specialty (i.e. Physical Therapy, Chiropractic, Neurology, etc.)? Or do they try to be everything to everyone? EMR companies with laser focus on a particular market have the unique industry and specialty knowledge built into the system. Those that try to service every medical discipline often are not a fit for specialty fields, requiring workarounds to handle unique specialty requirements.
3. Beta time? – When a software company is in “Beta” testing that refers to the practice of having consumers use the product and provide feedback to the company. If the company is in Beta, ask how long they have been in Beta. A very long Beta period (more than 3-5 months) signals a product that is not well received by the users and there have been many bugs and issues with the system that the company is trying to fix. A long Beta period could signal major problems for the consumers of the product.
4. Growth Chart – Ask how long the company has been on the market and how many users they have. Just because a company has been around a long time does not necessarily mean it is a good product. Which would you rather work with: a company that has been around for 15 years and has 7,000 users or a company that has been around for 2 years and has 4,000 users? The latter system has seen much better growth recently and is a hot item whereas the former system could have a flat growth line or worse, the user base could be declining. Neither of these bodes well for the future of that company or the users of the system.
5. Retention Ratio – Like the growth chart the retention ratio should be discovered. A retention ratio refers to how many users stay with a system compared to those that leave. No one system is great for everyone so each system has had users stop using the software for a variety of reasons. The trick is to find that ratio. Some vendors with bad retention ratios (i.e. a lot of users have quit) will be deceptive so ask the question in steps to make it harder for the vendor to dodge: How many users do you have? How many have left? The ratio is usually figured based on the contract term so a company with one year contracts could have 850 users renew this year and 150 quit which equals an 85% retention ratio. Anything over 90% is considered good, above 95% is really good and could lead to a strong future for the company.
6. Size of Team – The size of a PT software company’s team will help give a clue to the ability of the entity to grow. A company with one or two people who do both sales and service should be a red flag. The company might have a low cost due to low payroll expenses, but when you are a user and need assistance, the last thing you want is a busy signal or to not get to talk to someone because they are on a sales call. Look for companies that have defined sales teams and separate, focused support teams. This not only keeps users happy with good service but signals that the company has the ability to pay several people, not just one or two. How can you tell if the sales and support teams are separate and growing? Do you always get the same person when calling the main sales line? Call the main support number and see if the same person answers. Ideally, look for companies that grow their teams, again signaling strong growth.
7. Solvency Clues – A company that is solvent will spend money on marketing as they want to grow. This includes a quality website with a strong professional look, recent blog posts, regular press releases, as well as advertisements in industry periodicals that look clean and sharp. If a company has a website that looks dated or cluttered it could signal trouble. It costs a lot of money to have a clean and dynamic website so this is a great indicator. And with the magazine advertisements does it look like a software vendor put it together in 20 minutes using Word or was there a graphics professional behind the images? The overall branding of a therapy software system is a great clue to the solvency and staying power of that company.
Keep an eye on these “Things to Look For” and trim the companies that do not meet the grade. Then it will be much easier to manage your list of EMR systems to look into and you will be able to make a decision that you can be comfortable with.
