Physicians Practice - Tech Guide 2008 - (Page 57)

— a minimum of one week, and perhaps up to 10, depending upon your practice size and needs. But if you’ve done all your homework, it shouldn’t be a traumatic affair. Still, heed these hints and advice tidbits from those who’ve been there: • Train your staff twice. Blair noticed that his staff was ﬂoundering somewhat several months postimplementation, especially the veteran billers. This came from their deeply embedded knowledge of “the old way” of doing things. A session of advanced training, concentrating on tips and tricks to navigate the system more nimbly, helped get them back on track. • Insist on user compliance. “Some people got overwhelmed at the ‘go-live,’” says Blair. So instead of following the procedures and protocols they had just learned in training, they “set that work aside — and that becomes a habit.” Keep encouraging consistent compliance; it will come. • Reward positive behavior. Jenkins provided fun incentives to encourage positive attitudes toward training, including points-for-progress prize drawings. She even awarded coffee mugs depicting a woman in the midst of a hot flash that read, “I’m going through the change at OB/GYN Associates.” Jenkins says. “Even though they were supposed to do it, they were rewarded for it.” • Barter your tech support. OB/GYN Associates is “on the team that [the vendor] can use as a ‘site’ visit,” Jenkins says, meaning another practice may stop by for a demo. “So I insist we be as up-to-date as possible, and we get a discount on our support contract.” • Consider scrapping your legacy data. Why would you do this? All that information, seemingly wasted. “Because it gives the practice a chance to clean up its data,” says Blair. “We had 88 ‘Aetnas,’ all with the wrong address.” Be honest: Are your data worth cleaning up yourself? If outsourced, that could cost $10,000 or more. Re-entering as patients come in takes some time, but the data will be much more reliable. • Create or join a user group. There’s nothing like a good discussion over an issue of common interest. “Not everybody asks the same questions in their RFIs,” says Dolphin. “You become more informed: ‘How do you do this? How do you solve that?’ California is a different beast, although I’m sure every state has its beast.” Any major shift in a practice’s paradigm dictates that everyone involved be on board to ensure its success. Foot-draggers can really sap the positive energy ﬂow from everyone else. But with patience, calm insistence, and positive feedback, you can win over the most stubborn holdouts. Jenkins had one such case — a seasoned employee who kvetched bitterly about the new software, insisting she could never master it. But then Jenkins came in late on a day a site visit had been scheduled by another interested practice. “By the time I got here, she had done the whole tour. She’s the point-andclick queen now,” Jenkins chuckles. “When the person who’s been here the longest and fought me the hardest does the tour, that really warms my heart.” • Shirley Grace, senior writer for Physicians Practice, holds an MA in nonfiction writing from The Johns Hopkins University. Her articles have appeared in numerous publications, including The Washington Post and Notre Dame Business magazine. She can be reached at sgrace@physicianspractice.com. This article originally appeared in the February 2007 issue of Physicians Practice. WWW.PHYSICIANSPRACTICE.COM TECHNOLOGY GUIDE | PHYSICIANS PRACTICE | 57 http://WWW.PHYSICIANSPRACTICE.COM http://www.remindamerica.com http://WWW.PHYSICIANSPRACTICE.COM

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Physicians Practice - Tech Guide 2008

Physicians Practice - Tech Guide 2008 TG Cover Story: Protect Your Practice and Sleep Better Operations: Paperless? Not Quite The Internet: You've Got Mail...Or Do You? Patient Relations: Attention Grabbers The Tech Doctor: All About Blogs Lessons Learned: 'My EMR Nightmare...And Why I'd Do It Again' Scheduling: No More No-Shows The Marketplace: Who's Got Your Back IT Enhancement: Time, at Last, for an Upgrade? Online: 'Yup, I'm a Junkie. And Proud of It.' In the Office: New Technologies in the Workplace: Blessing or Curse? Web Surfing: If You Build It...

Physicians Practice - Tech Guide 2008

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