Health IT expertise helps practices rise to clinical reporting challenge

Enhanced Health IT Support

Value-based reimbursement holds the promise of increased earnings for practices who meet quality goals. But many doctors are frustrated with technology that doesn’t yet produce the kind of reporting they need to thrive in these contracts. In one recent survey, 61% of physicians said they believe EHRs negatively impact efficiency and productivity, and cite EHRs as a top burnout cause.

Electronic health records (EHRs) were originally designed for sending claims data, not reporting quality outcomes. Most EHR systems now have tools that should make pulling and reporting quality data simple, but practices can’t afford to allow a technical glitch to impact reimbursement because of missing or incorrect data.

HealthTeamWorks has been providing hands-on support to health centers, group practices and solo practices with enhanced health IT coaching and technical support for more than five years. Health IT experts help practices make sense out of vexing clinical quality measures reporting. They coach them through the steps required to pull the correct data, diagnose and solve technical issues and track data so practices can accurately report and reap the benefits of outcomes-based reimbursement.

Clinical quality measures are the bottom-line measurement system for value-based reimbursement programs such as the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation Center’s Transforming Clinical Practice initiative and Comprehensive Primary Care multi-payer initiatives. Increasingly, large health plans and state Medicaid programs require clinical quality measure reporting for practices to qualify for increased per member, per month payments and higher reimbursement rates.

On a monthly basis, HealthTeamWorks’ enhanced health IT support experts are in practices to problem solve and support the work of data reporting. They’re also available when problems arise, in-person or virtually.

HealthTeamWorks' Health IT expert offers an example of why health IT support is essential.

“Let’s say that a practice has an EHR and they’re screening for hypertension. They’re entering the readings into the EHR, and, based on that information, they’re pulling results for each patient with hypertension on a monthly basis to monitor and intervene. But they notice that only half their patients with hypertension are showing up on the list.” The practice could reach out to their enhanced health IT support expert to diagnose the problem. “Is it a workflow issue with the medical assistants entering the result in the wrong field. Or maybe it’s a glitch with the way they’re pulling the report. Or maybe the EHR had a software update and introduced a glitch into the system.”

“We’re solving problems, but equipping them to solve the problems themselves, too. One of the most common issues is validating that data is accurate so practices can report clinical quality measures.This is especially frustrating when a practice is up against a deadline to get measures submitted on time. We help practices improve workflow efficiency so they can do their jobs without running into barriers around extracting valid data.”

Active, regular coaching and in-the-moment expertise to troubleshoot EHR issues can save a practice thousands of dollars every year in overtime and manual data entry. Practices are free to see patients rather than wrestle with data systems that aren’t aligned with their workflow and data needs. Most importantly, accurate clinical quality measure reporting means practices are paid for the effort to meet and exceed value-based reimbursement goals.

Find out how your practice can save time and thrive under value-based care. Contact us at solutions@healthteamworks.org, or call us at 303.446.7200.