SpectraSoft.com | Online Medical Scheduling

05/07: AppointmentsEverywhere New Release

jwolf — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 16:00:11 +0000

Webinar: AE New Release

Presenter: Al Fiandaca, Product Manager, SpectraSoft

May 7th | 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. ET / 11 a.m. to noon PT

The latest AE version is coming soon! Register now and be the first to see these new tools. You will also get a refresher on other tips and tricks to help you schedule faster. New features that will be demonstrated include:

Scratch pad
Copy-paste columns to another resource
Track time by discipline
Swap patients on appointment

We will also review time-saving features already in the system, including copy/cut/paste functionality, printing, icons, security profiles, the check-in screen and reporting. You can also ask about any other aspect of AE during the Q&A session!

Can’t Attend? See the recording!

If you can’t attend the live webinar, register and you will receive a link to the recording when it’s available. Reserve your place today.

How much does that sticky note cost?

jwolf — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 18:16:12 +0000

When you hear the word paperless, what comes to mind? In healthcare we usually mean electronic healthcare records and how that affects clinicians.

But what about the front desk? Even if you’ve already moved to electronic scheduling, your medical scheduler may still be inundated with paper:

Faxes to and from other medical practices
Notes from the clinician to reach out to a doctor, patient or insurance company
Tasks from the office manager written on a sticky note
Phone messages, appointment requests and more

All of that paper costs your healthcare practice a fortune: It has to be filed and stored…it can’t be easily measured or managed…it’s easily lost or forgotten… illegible handwriting leads to costly delays…and there is little or no accountability attached to all those sheets, notes, pads and scraps.

If you can see there may be a problem, your first step is to calculate the cost of all that paper. What does it cost your practice if you lose one patient or one referral source because important to-do’s fell through the cracks? How much time does your office manager, practice owner and front desk team spend each month chasing after paper? A thorough analysis would include:

Costs of the actual paper, files, filing time and storage space
Added time spent on practice management reporting and the reports you can’t create
Ineffective staff management caused by lack of accountability
Lower productivity at the front desk.

Once you have a good idea of the total cost of paper at your medical practice, you can make informed decisions on how to invest in your front desk with tools like:

Office-wide task management
One-touch scanning and archiving of paper files
In-Out faxing and archiving
Completely automated text/phone/email appointment reminders

We would be happy to show you completely paperless solutions to these needs. See a demonstration or simply ask a question. We’d love to hear from you!

Jefferson Center for Mental Health

jwolf — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 23:33:07 +0000

Scheduling autism treatment is highly complex — with complex recurring visits involving multiple therapists…exhaustive documentation requirements and a client base that requires a great deal of flexibility. “We were struggling,” says the founder of the agency. “We had paper flow charts taped all over the wall trying to match staff with students. It was a mess.”

SpectraSoft User Review:

Jefferson Center for Mental Health

Mental health providers are under greater pressure than ever before. Budget concerns, regulatory changes, and the burdensome requirements of funding sources have converged to produce a “perfect storm.”

The challenges facing Jefferson Center for Mental Health, a non-profit mental health facility in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, are common to similar facilities all across the country. With an ever-increasing number of individuals and families seeking access to services, resources must be able to handle the load.
In order to meet the growing needs of its community, Jefferson Center took a proactive approach and identified ways to increase administrative efficiency and improve its infrastructure. A primary aspect of that approach was appointment scheduling.

“The scheduler we were using needed substantial enhancement,” says Vicki Williams, a business analyst in the IS department and project manager behind the scheduling overhaul. “We needed a product that was more intuitive and offered broader functionality. For example, our previous scheduler didn’t allow for removing only one appointment in a series of recurring appointments, so if you deleted one, you had to delete the whole series. We were spending a lot of programming time trying to make it work with our changing business needs.”

Williams began the search for a new scheduler. “AppointmentsEverywhere was the best one we found. We were able to integrate it with our current EHR/billing system.”

Centralized Scheduling Makes
Care More Available

Jefferson Center has over twenty outpatient locations, including satellite offices in community settings such as schools and nursing homes, with myriad providers such as physicians, prescribing nurses, psychologists, case managers, and counselors. According to Williams, “With the old scheduler, it was difficult to communicate appointment availability between locations.
“One of the center’s top initiatives was to maximize personnel resources across all sites, and that meant moving to a centralized scheduling concept. That way, if a doctor from a nearby office had a cancellation and a client from another office was willing to travel, the client could get in for an appointment right away versus potentially waiting longer for an opening at the original office. Centralized scheduling has enabled us to provide even better customer service by getting clients in sooner.”

Clinicians Gain More Time
to Spend with Clients

Another of Jefferson Center’s goals was to reduce the scheduling burden on clinicians so that they could focus their time on what they do best – helping clients.

“The clinicians were handling their own schedules, and many were spending a lot of time on it,” Williams recalls. “After scheduling an appointment, if the client called back to reschedule, the clinician usually would be with another client, requiring the caller to leave a voicemail. Often, when the clinicians returned the call, they would end up leaving a voicemail in return. There was a lot of back-and-forth until they finally made contact, which was not the best use of our clinical staff’s time. They would much rather being seeing clients than scheduling appointments.”

The scheduling system also provides color-coding options. The agency assigns unique colors to quickly identify consultant time spent directly with the client; indirect time spent on case management; school-funded visits; overlapping appointments with multiple consultants; client meetings and more.

The solution was to empower the support staff with the added capabilities of the new scheduling system. With Appointments Everywhere, the centralized scheduling group could see available resources at any Jefferson Center location and reschedule clients immediately.

“Our front desk staff really like it. They’re constantly blown away by all that they can do.”

“We want the majority of our rescheduling to go through our scheduling department, so our clinicians can spend more time on care.”

Locking In Best Practices Makes
Clinicians More Efficient

The features of AppointmentsEverywhere have made Jefferson Center’s scheduling process more efficient. Support staff can clearly define appointments, assign default procedure times, and color-code each procedure, making the clinicians’ schedules easier to read at a glance. This saves the clinicians time by giving them the information they need without having to open and view the details of each appointment.

Finding Open Times in
a Crowded Schedule

Ask Williams if the scheduling has improved, and her answer is emphatic. “Oh yes! There are so many things we can do now, like find an open slot with an automated search, instead of manually going through the schedule day by day. We can also hold appointment times for different programs. For example, we have an older adult program, and we can put holds in the schedule for that specific program, something we were never ever able to do before.”

This means that when an eligible client comes in for that program, a scheduler can run a quick search and instantly find an available appointment in the vast, heavily-booked schedule at Jefferson Center.

The wait list used to be a tedious process that was managed on paper at each location. Thanks to AppointmentsEverywhere, when a client cancels an appointment, an electronic wait list automatically pops up, displaying clients waiting for an open appointment time.

If the open appointment time does not work for anyone on the wait list, the time slot is cleared and the scheduling team can easily see that the space is available and focus on filling it.

Better Scheduling Makes
For Happier People

Change is always difficult, but Williams is excited about the speed of adoption. “Normally when you implement something new, people want to hang on to what they know. But our staff are already telling me, ‘I love this product. It’s so much easier than the old scheduler.’ The product is amazing.”

Williams adds, “Our front desk staff really like it now. They want more and more information about what the scheduler can do so that they can do more things more quickly. They’re constantly blown away by all that they can do now.”

This year, Jefferson Center was able to implement same-day access for clients. “Clients can now meet with a clinical staff member the same day they call or walk in. We could not have managed the necessary staffing without centralized scheduling and our new scheduler. It’s been great!”

5 Simple Steps to More Referrals

jwolf — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 16:22:41 +0000

Webinar Recording:

Boost patient traffic with social media

The Internet has completely changed how people research information online. Patients are more tech-savvy and are able to look up medical conditions, treatment options and healthcare providers for themselves or loved ones. In order to be competitive and keep in front of this growing population of tech-savvy patients you need to have online content that speaks to them and engages them in a variety of ways.

Internet Marketing Specialist Samuel Awosolu, PT discusses how to use a blog as a marketing platform to attract patient referrals. He also discusses tools that engage patients on your social media networks and build stronger relationships. You’ll become a trusted source to patients seeking information about their conditions, possible treatments and who would be appropriate healthcare providers for their illness.

How to use a blog to increase traffic to your website.
How to effectively network with other healthcare providers on social media to increase new patient referral sources.
Simple strategies to use Facebook.
How to promote your practice with a YouTube video
How to use specific “call to actions” in your online content to drive patients to your clinic/facility.

Samuel Awosolu is a licensed physical therapist with a background in marketing, Web and mobile development. He has written articles for Advance Magazine, PT Products Online and numerous industry magazines and blogs. He has helped many physical therapists and other healthcare providers promote their websites, increase online traffic generation, develop new patient referral strategies and merge offline and online marketing campaigns. You can learn more at http://www.ptmarketingunleashed.com.

Mediware Acquires MediServe

jwolf — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 21:12:59 +0000

Mediware Information Systems, Inc., a provider of comprehensive healthcare IT software solutions, announced today that it has acquired Chandler-based MediServe, a provider of electronic documentation solutions for inpatient and acute care rehabilitation, outpatient rehabilitation and respiratory care facilities. This includes the SpectraSoft brand.

Founded in 1986, MediServe focuses on improving clinical and business workflow while actively addressing regulatory compliance and revenue cycle improvement. MediServe software products are used in more than 2,500 customer facilities including hospital networks and outpatient and private practice providers. Mediware plans to leverage MediServe solutions to expand the current focus of the company’s ‘Alternate Care Solutions’ product line, which was formed to provide workflow, billing and reimbursement support for home infusion, home medical equipment and home health agencies.

MediServe is recognized in the industry for its significant domain knowledge in rehabilitation and respiratory care. MediServe has leveraged this expertise, in combination with the guidance of its leading customers, in the design of a cloud-based (SaaS) solution that addresses the industry’s unique workflow, reimbursement and regulatory requirements. MediServe’s proven approach also helps customers enhance revenue, improve the quality of care and increase employee productivity. Core offerings include the MediLinks suite of products for inpatient rehabilitation, outpatient rehabilitation and respiratory management. Other key products include the SpectraSoft medical scheduling software.

“Most analysts agree that the percentage of care delivered outside traditional hospital rooms will continue to increase over the next twenty years,” said Thomas Mann, Mediware’s president and chief executive officer. “To meet these growing needs Mediware has aggressively pursued technologies that improve the effectiveness of these organizations, looking to improve quality and efficiencies, while lowering costs. Our expansion into home infusion, home medical equipment and home health are examples of this strategy.”

Mediware’s acquisition history includes the 2008 acquisition of specialty pharmacy provider, Hann’s On Software, the 2009 acquisition of Healthcare Automation, and the 2011 acquisition of CareCentric. Together these acquisitions formed the basis of Mediware’s Alternate Care Solutions product strategy which provides workflow, billing and reimbursement support for care providers that typically reside outside the four walls of the hospital. These services have increasingly been in demand as a cost-effective method for lengthy treatments that do not require a hospital stay.

“Through the addition of MediServe, we expand our focus to include rehabilitation and respiratory care,” continued Mr. Mann. “MediServe has strong reputation and a blue chip customer base that is consistent with our other product groups. The team shares similar solution and service philosophies, and their market-leading product suite offers customers a compelling edge and an immediate return on investment. We look forward to helping this team grow their business.”

MediServe software is used by some of the country’s most prestigious healthcare organizations, including many that already use other Mediware-designed products. Mediware’s plan is to leverage existing resources and relationships to help accelerate MediServe’s growth, and to broaden Mediware’s solution footprint with care providers outside the hospital.

“There are tremendous synergies between MediServe and Mediware,” concluded Mr. Mann. “The MediServe product strategy is in clear alignment with our approach through our Alternate Care Solutions product line. Further, MediServe targets the large and prestigious organizations in healthcare, a market segment where we are well established with all our products. I expect this to be a seamless transition for our combined teams.”

MediServe represents the eleventh Mediware acquisition in six years, and the fourth the company has completed in calendar 2012. During the year Mediware was also acquired by the private equity firm Thoma Bravo, a transaction that was finalized on November 9, 2012.

Best Practices for the Front Desk

jwolf — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 19:18:10 +0000

Webinar Recording:

Your front desk creates the first impression of your practice — make it count!

Your front desk plays a role in many aspects of your practice, from patient service to reimbursement. This 5-step blueprint for front desk management can make life easier for staff, office managers and owners alike. When everyone has the same expectations, you see better results and increase job satisfaction. Topics include:

Patient Service — Tools and methods to impress the people you serve
Reimbursement — Your role in insurance compliance and collections
Practice Support — Scheduling and communication tips to enhance clinician productivity
Patient Compliance — How you can reduce no-shows and contribute to patient outcomes
Marketing — Ways you can contribute to adding new patients to the practice

These best practices are gathered from our experience with over 5,000 hospitals and clinics. Discover new approaches to patient intake, scheduling, workflow management and office communication.

Who Should Watch?

Practice Owners and Office Managers
Outpatient Department Directors and Managers
Front Desk Personnel

8 Steps to Reduce No-Shows

jwolf — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 21:15:33 +0000

One of the biggest drains on your clinic or outpatient department is the problem of cancellations and no-shows. Fortunately, this is a problem with many potential solutions. This FREE white paper details a practice-wide approach that can both cut your no-show rate and increase your patient retention dramatically.

White Paper:

Slash No-Shows and Cancellations
with this 8-Step Action Plan

How to identify and correct misperceptions about the importance of attendance;
What to say (and not say) in reminder messages;
How to organize everyone on your staff to play a role in encouraging perfect attendance;

You can also compare the best ways to automate messaging to patients and responsible parties. There’s much more in this comprehensive roadmap to enhance patient compliance. Please fill out the form at right to download your white paper…

St. Joseph’s Hospital

jwolf — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 20:51:59 +0000

Since the implementation of Spectrasoft Scheduling, Saint Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation Program has been able to: (1) Quickly adapt to an electronic scheduling environment; (2) Eliminate scheduling errors; (3)Significantly improve patient satisfaction; (4) Gain greater insight into appointment no-shows and cancellation trends.

SpectraSoft User Review:

Saint Joseph’s Hospital

The Impact of Spectrasoft

Since the implementation of Spectrasoft Scheduling, Saint Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation Program has been able to:

Quickly adapt to an electronic scheduling environment;
Eliminate scheduling errors and significantly improve patient satisfaction;
Gain greater insight into appointment no-shows and cancellation trends.

A Challenging Environment

Scheduling patients for St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation team was a challenge at best. The front desk staff used four large appointment books to schedule patients between the various therapy services.

Scheduling appointments between the four appointment books was time consuming and complicated. This caused a lot of issues with patient service and satisfaction.

Schedulers had to always pay extra close attention when making changes and make sure they were moving appointments to the right time slot, the right book and the right therapist.

On many occasions, human errors occurred as schedulers manually entered new appointments into the books, or moved appointments when a patient needed to reschedule.

Tracking Patient Compliance

Additionally, it was nearly impossible to keep track of appointment no-shows and cancellations. The only way to get an idea of how many patients cancelled, and why they cancelled, was by manually flipping through the books and counting the missed appointments.

St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation team recognized the need for a change to their scheduling process and decided to implement an electronic scheduling system in their clinic.

“We are a busy hospital-based clinic. We could not continue scheduling the high volume of patients we see on paper and achieve the efficiency we needed,” stated Dr. L.A. Campbell, Manager for Outpatient Rehab Services, St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation Program.

Scheduling on a Whole New Level

Shortly after St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation implemented the SpectraSoft Scheduling solution in their busy facility, they noticed significant improvements in their overall scheduling process. The scheduling staff gained the efficiency they had been looking for and patient satisfaction improved considerably.

Easy-to-Learn, Efficient

Spectrasoft Scheduling is designed with the end user in mind. Schedulers at St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation Facility quickly learned the new system and were up and running in no time.

“Our schedule is so much cleaner now with Spectrasoft. We’ve eliminated errors and our patients are much happier!”

The new process has proven to be highly effective. According to Dr. Campbell, “Now, our schedulers no longer waste time waiting around for an appointment book to become free. The schedule is conveniently there and ready to go whenever a patient needs to be scheduled.”

Goodbye Scheduling Errors

Another notable improvement St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation noticed is in patient satisfaction. “When we were scheduling on paper, our schedulers were spending up to three hours a day handling patient complaints because of scheduling malfunctions.

With Spectrasoft Scheduling, our patient complaint volume related to scheduling has gone down to zero,” confirmed Campbell. Schedulers now have a clean view of the entire clinic’s schedule. As a result, the occurrences of human errors have been eliminated and patients are satisfied.

Color-Coded Appointments

The color-coded functionality in Spectrasoft Scheduling provides the visual clarity the busy scheduling staff needs. Appointments are color-coded based on the service area allowing schedulers to efficiently schedule multi-service appointments.

Additionally, therapists no longer have to flip through pages in an appointment book to see their schedule for the day.

“Spectrasoft Scheduling is so visually appealing and easy to read. It really helps our schedulers coordinate multi-service appointments and keeps our therapists up-to-date as the schedule changes throughout the day,” stated Campbell.

Tracking No-shows

With Spectrasoft Scheduling, St. Joseph’s Outpatient Rehabilitation Facility has gained deeper insight into appointment no-shows and cancellation trends. Schedulers can now easily keep track of the number of missed appointments and see trends for when and why a patient is cancelling or missing appointments.

Spectrasoft Scheduling has also been extremely helpful in maintaining compliance to Medicare requirements.

“The tracking capability of Spectrasoft Scheduling helps us clearly see why our patients are not coming in for their visits. This has really helped our therapists provide Medicare with required documentation that clearly explains why a patient is not receiving their treatment,” stated Campbell.

10-Step Management Action Plan

jwolf — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 19:34:56 +0000

Since 1993, SpectraSoft has worked with thousands of providers from across the country to reduce their no-show rate. Now you can download some of the best information we’ve gathered…FREE.

White Paper:

Gain a Bird’s-Eye View of No-Shows

with this 10-Step Management Action Plan

Since 1993, SpectraSoft has worked with thousands of providers from across the country to reduce their no-show rate. Now you can download some of the best information we’ve gathered…FREE.

Find out what your front desk isn’t telling you

Your staff are the first to greet your patients and the last to say goodbye. They also have access to eye-opening data you’re not seeing. Here’s what they would tell you…if you could ask.

Understand the unique roles of therapists, front desk and support staff

Everyone in your organization has a responsibility to your clients. This step-by-step approach will help you establish a system of accountability that ultimately leads to better patient outcomes.

Discover what your patients think about missing a visit

You’ll be shocked at what multiple studies reveal! Read how to implement a practice-wide system that sets proper expectations for patients.

Download the complete ’10-Step Management Action Plan’

SpectraSoft has already helped nearly 5,000 hospitals and clinics increase revenue through enhanced scheduling. Now find out how you can give yourself an immediate 5-10% raise — simply by reducing your no-shows with ideas proven to work.

Make Compliance Automatic

jwolf — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 18:28:53 +0000

It’s inevitable that audits, denials and underpayments will target a growing number of providers in the future. Your choice: you can hope to dodge the bullets like everyone else, or you can remove the ‘bullseye’ from your organization’s back.

White Paper:

Take the “Compliance Bullseye” Off Your Back

With This Common-Sense Approach to Coding and Reimbursement

This white paper will show you:

How to automate best practices that lead to fewer denials and audits;
Why coding & billing aren’t the answer to compliance and reimbursement;
If you’re thinking about compliance, that may be your first mistake!

To thrive in today’s challenging compliance-reimbursement environment, you need to respond to what payors are doing in a rational, scalable fashion. Find out how in this FREE white paper…

SpectraSoft.com | Online Medical Scheduling

05/07: AppointmentsEverywhere New Release

Webinar: AE New Release

Presenter: Al Fiandaca, Product Manager, SpectraSoft

May 7th | 2 p.m. to 3 p.m. ET / 11 a.m. to noon PT

Can’t Attend? See the recording!

How much does that sticky note cost?

Jefferson Center for Mental Health

SpectraSoft User Review:

Jefferson Center for Mental Health

5 Simple Steps to More Referrals

Webinar Recording:

Boost patient traffic with social media

Mediware Acquires MediServe

Best Practices for the Front Desk

Webinar Recording:

Your front desk creates the first impression of your practice — make it count!

Who Should Watch?

8 Steps to Reduce No-Shows

White Paper:

Slash No-Shows and Cancellations with this 8-Step Action Plan

St. Joseph’s Hospital

SpectraSoft User Review:

Saint Joseph’s Hospital

The Impact of Spectrasoft

A Challenging Environment

Tracking Patient Compliance

Scheduling on a Whole New Level

Easy-to-Learn, Efficient

Goodbye Scheduling Errors

Color-Coded Appointments

Tracking No-shows

10-Step Management Action Plan

White Paper:

Gain a Bird’s-Eye View of No-Shows

with this 10-Step Management Action Plan

Find out what your front desk isn’t telling you

Understand the unique roles of therapists, front desk and support staff

Discover what your patients think about missing a visit

Download the complete ’10-Step Management Action Plan’

Make Compliance Automatic

White Paper:

Take the “Compliance Bullseye” Off Your Back

With This Common-Sense Approach to Coding and Reimbursement

This white paper will show you:

Slash No-Shows and Cancellations
with this 8-Step Action Plan