2010 Mission: Healthcare

In the medical community it is widely known, maybe even universally accepted, that governor Janet Napitolino’s mission is to make Electronic Health Records (EHR) common in Arizona by 2010. While EHR is one step of many to reduce healthcare delivery costs and improve operational efficiencies, it’s not without enormous challenges to providers (medical practitioners) and staff. The ambitious imperative is an investment in software, equipment and network bandwidth, staff time to convert paper to digital records, training and so on.

Providers should critically examine relevant sources to getting started on the EHR path. First is turning to product certification. The Certification Commission for Healthcare Information Technology (CCHIT) is charged with certifying vendor products on three points—Functionality, Interoperability and Security. This certification enables physicians to evaluate a few out of many vendors. Second is to gain intelligence about various systems by using the Internet and examining products on web sites. The other get-started approach is to seek the support of a quality Information Technology service provider already experienced in EHR systems. Also, if necessary, broadening the banking relationship to include a line of credit based on a provider’s FICO score. While there are more key steps, the all important ones are the commitment to change and the support of the physicians and staff to ensure change is permanent.

Offices Getting On Board

It is certainly noteworthy to mention that Arizona has a hand full of medical practices that are making headway on improving their practice through the proper use of advance technology and can be viewed as pioneers in this arena. One local company, Scottsdale-based, LifeScape Medical Associates continues to optimize the advances in technology. Dr.Wilder, medical provider, invested substantial life savings several years ago. The benefits of moving to an EHR system and using wireless voice communication devices to simplify interoffice communications out weighed expenses, explains Lifescape owner, Dr. Susan Wilder.

Equipping Medical Office Buildings (MOB’s) with “cost-effective, smart bandwidth” by using vendors such as Time Warner Telecom, a savvy technology user, such as LifeScape Medical Associates will make good use of faster, more economical bandwidth (T1’s, cable or fiber optics) to enable transmission of small to large files to radiologists, laboratory firms, vaults for offsite data back up and restore, or billing companies, etc. With the Governor pushing digital records by 2010, a more cost-effective transport solution must be a requirement, not a necessity.

Shifting Forces

Further, the telecom industry is moving swiftly and confidently with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) which enables telephone calls to use a broadband Internet connection. And in the same breath, Session Internet Protocol (SIP trunking) is gaining momentum in the telecom arena, which is an application enabling improved station-to-station communications and lower telecom costs. SIP trunking works on DSL, cable, and T1 transports, and the combination of VoIP and SIP will go a long way in streamlining communications.

In addition to these advances in the telecom community, the traditional business phone system is being replaced with software based IP PBX systems at an unprecedented rate. The advances include hosted services, which offer medical practices substantial cost savings over premise-based PBX’s. The decision to go hosted is a choice based on considerations such as balance sheets, cash outlay, favorable tax treatment, and technological obsolescence, just to name a few.

These advances require sufficient bandwidth when converging voice and data on the same transport. Further, installing such a system as the main PBX in an MOB would further accelerate the modernization of a medical practice. Telesphere, for example, provides telecom services to the Phoenix Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA), which significantly reduces BOMA’s overhead costs.

A large percentage of Arizona medical practices are likely to operate Electronic Healthcare Record systems by 2010. The vision is for practice management and EHR vendors to revolutionize information technology; for patients to experience office processing and communication efficiencies; and for the medical office building industry to contribute to the intelligent healthcare technology imperative.