One of the major parts of business is ensuring that you are being paid for services rendered. This can be a painful process; some clients just don't seem to want to pay. There are numerous things you can do to ensure revenu comes in, one essential process to employ is revenue cycle management. While this may sound complicated, the idea is simple: Taking steps to assure that you get paid in a timely fashion.

As you likely know, the revenue cycle starts long before you see a patient. It actually begins when the patient calls to make an appointment, at which time you must capture crucial information, including the patient's name, contact information and, insurance number or policy information. The cycle continues throughout the appointment and doesn’t end until the balance on the patient’s account is zero; they have paid their bill.

As you might have guessed data gathering is essential to successful revenue cycle management. In many countries, the largest part of this cycle, and the most important data needed revolves around a patient's insurance. This information needs to be gathered and verified before his or her appointment.

You may feel you simply don't have the time to spend making phone calls, faxes or even emails to verify insurance before the patient arrives. This is really a crucial step that can't be skipped, if you do miss this step, you have to verify insurance when the patient checks in, and that’s inefficient because it adds to the amount of time a patient is in the office, therefore decreasing the number of patients you can see. Any snafu will put the whole office’s schedule behind for the day.

If you verifying the patient's insurance before his or her appointment, however, you can easily correct any problems before the appointment—rescheduling the patient, for example, or getting correct coverage information. With the correct information, you can better manage a large percentage of your revenue cycle, and may even reduce the time it takes for you to earn revenue.

One of the better ways to manage the revenue cycle is through the use of a fully integrated practice management solution like gloCare from gloStream. If you are looking for a better way to not only manage your revenue but your whole practice, please contact us today to see how we can help.

Ninety-four percent of healthcare organizations suffered at least one data breach in 2011 and 2012, according to a recent study on patient privacy and data security - a statistic that illustrates how important a secure electronic medical record (EMR) is to any healt-care organization.

The study, conducted by the Ponemon Institute, also found that 45 percent of these organizations actually experienced more than five data breaches in 2011 and 2012.

Common causes of breaches included technology glitches, lost devices, employee and third-party error, and even criminal attacks—and the Ponemon Institute estimates they cost the U.S. health care industry $7 billion each year.

With gloCare, gloStream’s flagship product, you can easy knowing you won’t become a statistic. With gloCare, integration between gloCare and other third-party best-of-breed applications is handled through a standards-based HL7 protocol, providing secure remote access to patient records. gloCare 6.0 is ONC-ATCB certified, and gloStream was one of the very first EMR companies to put a product through the certification testing process.

What this means for your organization is that your system is protected by some of the most powerful security standards and tools in the industry. If you are worried about the security of your essential files, contact us today to see how can help prevent you from data breaches.

Health-care providers face significant obstacles in implementing analytic tools, but if the suggestions in a new white paper work, gloEMR could help.

The paper, entitled “Transforming Health Care Through Big Data,” is meant to offer providers some models for “innovative uses of data assets that can enable them to reduce costs, improve quality, and provide more accessible care,” according to its authors.

Published by the Institute for Health Technology Transformation (iHT2), it draws on the expertise of leaders from Kaiser Permanente, IBM, Sharp Community Medical Group, Newton Medical Center and University of Manitoba to show how health-care providers can, "make better, evidence-based decisions."

Nine strategies are offered, including using tools such as dashboards for clinicians to visualize incoming data. As big data moves toward real-time processing, often at the point of care, the white paper reads, “organizations should strive to update processes and develop capabilities to enable tool use, and focus on real- or near-real time clinical decision support."

gloEMR — gloStream’s flagship EMR — is widely known for its user-friendly dashboard. Through the gloEMR dashboard, doctors and staff can track a patient’s location from admission to discharge, access and share daily schedules and calendars, order labs, refill prescriptions, and more. Day, week and month views of schedules and calendars are available in a familiar format. And, layout schemes can be customized for better visibility.

A new survey of 17,000 physicians by Black Book Rankings concludes that as many of 17 percent of physicians will switch electronic medical records (EMR) in 2013 because their first- choice systems aren’t meeting vendor expectations—a problem easily avoided with gloEMR, gloStream’s flagship EMR.

Most concerning to the EMR users surveyed were unmet requests made for sophisticated interfaces with other practice programs, for example. That’s not a problem with gloEMR, which is built on Microsoft technology and embedded with Microsoft Office, meaning it has a familiar look and feel. Additionally, most physicians already know how to operate it. Top that off with a user-friendly dashboard, and you have one of the most usable EMRs on the market.

“The high performance vendors emerging as viable past 2015 are those dedicating responsive teams to address customers’ current demands,” said Black Book’s managing partner Doug Brown, in a news release. gloEMR is one of those systems.

Other concerns for physicians considering a switch were complex connectivity and networking schemes, pacing with accountable-care progresses, and the rapid EMR adoption of mobile devices, the survey finds. gloStream is committed to keeping up with the changing EMR environment, and our confident that gloEMR can meet these needs as well.

When Ashley Ledger needed to increase his podiatry practice’s efficiency, he turned to gloStream’s flagship product, gloEMR - with great results.

Ledger, who has approximately 8,000 patients on record, sees around 480 per month and takes on 15 to 20 new ones a week at Ledger Foot and Ankle Clinic in Killeen, Texas.

By implementing glowEMR, he cut down overhead costs by USD$2,000 per month (thanks to savings on paper, dictation supplies and equipment). He also improved documentation, which resulted in increased billings.

According to Ledger, one of his favorite features of gloEMR is its voice recognition technology, which captures details during the patient encounter and puts them in exam notes. Ledger dictates into a USB-connected microphone and his words appear on the screen, in a Microsoft Word document. The Microsoft technology, he says, is particularly appealing for its ease of use.

Ledger can also take photos of patients that automatically become a part of the patient’s file, personalizing the doctor-patient experience.

If you would like to learn how gloEMR can help improve your practice, please contact us today. We may have a solution for you.

E-prescribing is widely considered to be a good thing. Is your electronic medical record (EMR) robust enough to handle it, as is gloStream’s fully integrated electronic medical record and practice management solution gloSuite?

A new briefing paper from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) gives some numbers that reveal just how quickly e-prescribing is being adopted.

Between December 2008 and June 2012, the ONC studied changes in rates of physician e-prescribing as well as the capability of pharmacies to accept e-prescriptions.

During that time, e-prescribing increased by 41 percentage points: In December 2008, 7 percent of U.S. physicians were e-prescribing using an EMR; by June 2012, 48 percent were.

Moreover, the growth in e-prescribing wasn’t limited to physicians. In the time period the ONC studied, the percentage of community pharmacies that could accept e-prescriptions grew from 76 percent to 94 percent.

The full report can be found here. For more information about gloSuite, gloStream's robust, flagship product, contact us.

As a busy medical professional, you probably struggle to manage the business. If so, you may want to consider a practice management software, which simplifies scheduling, billing, and creating practice reports - and gloStream offers just such a solution.

gloStream - which offers one of the industry’s most advanced and stable electronic medical records (EMRs) - now offers gloPM, a powerful yet easy-to-learn and use practice management system.

gloPM is built on Microsoft technology and embedded with Microsoft Office, meaning it has a familiar look and feel. That makes true practice management easier than it’s ever been before.

How can you benefit from gloPM? It offers one-click access to patient’s referring physician, insurance eligibility, appointment schedule, and payment status. It streamlines billing and claims processing. It integrates insurance claims scrubbing with real-time error reconciliation. And it offers analytic reporting for practice management improvement.

Doctors all over the country are experiencing gains in productivity by using gloPM; contact us today if you’d like to learn how you can as well.

The federal government delayed the start of meaningful Stage 2 to 2014, but that doesn’t give health-care providers much time to relax in their pursuit of electronic medical record (EMR) implementation.

One challenge is that health-care providers will no longer have full control over qualification for some measures. For example, new standards require eligible providers to offer 50 percent of their patients access to their own health records through a portal - and 5 percent of patients have to use the portal.

Another requirement: Health-care providers must generate an electronic summary care record for at least 65 percent of transitions of care and referrals. And, this must include at least 10 percent of transitions or referrals to unaffiliated providers using a different EHR system.

One common denominator among these changes: Stage 2 makes EMR usability essential. Fortunately, usability is one of the strengths of gloEMR, gloSTREAM’s flagship EMR. It’s based on Microsoft Office technology, most physicians already know how to operate it. Top that off with a user-friendly dashboard, and you have one of the most usable EMRs on the market.

With changes like these in the words, EMR vendors are updating their products to meet the new 2014 EHR certification standards, and that means thousands of health-care providers will install or upgrade their systems next year. You may have to get in line if you don’t start now - but when you do, consider a usable EMR such as gloEMR.

Now that usability testing is part of the electronic medical record (EMR) certification criteria for meaningful use Stage 2, EMR usability is suddenly all the talk—and according to a diverse group of industry insiders, one of the greatest concern is errors.

The problem? Physicians are worried that they might select an EMR that turns out to be hard to use. That, in turn, could decrease time physicians spend with patients. As a result, physicians get frustrated and may rush—and that could lead to errors.

“I really think it’s a good step for ONC to start pushing the vendors toward more user-friendly systems," says Robert Tennant, senior policy advisor for the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA).

How does gloStream’s flagship product—gloEMR—stack up? it’s based on Microsoft Office technology, most physicians already know how to operate it. Top that off with a user-friendly dashboard, and you have one of the most usable EMRs on the market.

gloEMR also answers another usability common concern: training. gloStream uses an innovative implementation process called gloStream Detailed Needs Analysis, or gloDNA. During this process, gloStream gathers information to help create an ideal EMR solution and help practices get back to full patient load within 15 days. It’s a guarantee.

CIOs can very likely expect some sleepless nights now that the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the Affordable Care Act—and will likely need to search for robust electronic medical records (EMRs).

“Transforming the delivery of health care will take much more than the strike of a gavel or stroke of a pen,” says Rich Umbdenstock, the American Hospital Association's president.

According to Umbdenstock, “it calls for the entire health care community to continue to work together, along with patients and purchasers, to implement better-coordinated, high-quality care."

One challenge will come from the mandate to achieve better-coordinated care. Certainly, over the past few years, there have been efforts made to improve coordination, as evidenced by meaningful use rules—but there’s a much bigger task ahead of IT departments in finding a way to coordinate between medical practices, hospitals and rehab centers as well as all the other players, such as home-health agencies.

Another challenge will come from the mandate to prove that all of the systems being implemented will actually improve clinical outcomes. “We're talking here about much more robust EHRs, patient portals, CPOEs, personal health records, and health information exchanges,” writes InformationWeek Health Care Editor Paul Cerrato.

When it comes to EHRs, none is more robust that gloSTREAM’s flagship EMR, gloEMR. If you’re concerned about keeping up with the Affordable Care Act, contact us today. We can show you how gloEMR can help.