UBMD

The PatientKeeper practice management software that was tested for basic billing functions last fall is making a good impression so far on the UBMD pediatrics, physical medicine and rehabilitation physicians who are using it for charge capture.

Over the next year or so, UBMD will encourage other practices to adopt the technology as new functions, or modules, are added to the system to improve the practice of medicine, especially work flow.

The practice management system at Women and Children's Hospital of Buffalo works very well with PatientKeeper, and Kaleida has been helpful with syncing the systems. All modalities the hospitalists currently used at Kaleida are now compatible to their handhelds.

John V. Pastore, MD, director of pediatric hospital medicine at Women and Children's and UB assistant professor of clinical pediatrics, uses the system every day. Although it is loaded onto their handheld "smartphones," Pastore and some of the other six physicians using the system prefer accessing it at a computer terminal (which allows them a chance to get off their feet after a day on rounds). Peter Winkelstein, MD, chief of the division of pediatrics, is one exception; he regularly uses PatientKeeper on the go.

Overall, the physicians testing the system liked PatientKeeper's billing module. It eliminates archaic billing cards that could easily be lost. "We could lose a week of billing on a single patient," Pastore says. Initial demos show the new charge capture system to be a good way of tracking patients and giving physicians mobile access to all patient billing information, thus eliminating the need to write out and distribute the card. Physicians anticipate using the system more for sign-outs and note taking.

Of the two available phone models, the test physicians went with AT&T's Tilt phone. "The phone is a little heavy, but it does what it needs to do and the big screen is convenient," Pastore says.

PatientKeeper's most striking improvement in charge capture is claim turnover time. According to Cathy Labruna, billing manager for UPA, claims that used to take three weeks to process now take one day. "PatientKeeper feeds right into our billing system, so all we do is verify the data and send it out for the next day's transmission," she says. Although she hasn't yet analyzed how much money has been saved, Labruna says the reimbursements "definitely come faster because claims are processed faster." She and her staff find the system very user-friendly, requiring minimal training; they especially like its built-in edit functions.

The doctors also like sending text and e-mail messages through their smartphones, which they say saves time, keeps them connected to other physicians and staff, and helps track patients.