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Implementing an Electronic Medical Record

Facility Advocate

Hiring Caris as your Advocate means you always have someone in your corner.  Post selection, business requirements, enhancements, testing, troubleshooting and implementation all require interactions with the vendor.

 

Caris builds the relationship with the vendor, understands the business strategy and works to obtain the best solution for the issues identified. 

 

Issues can be requirements for additional development work, reduction of burdensome processes and obtaining optimal system performance. Caris can provide this role working with your Project Manager or as the Project Manager for your project.

Project Management

Implementing an electronic medical record or electronic health record can be an expensive and daunting task.  Caris provides a working Project Manager not just a task master by:

  • Identifying and mapping out your current processes to identify opportunities for improvement;

  • Work with your staff to develop more efficient processes prior to your selection to eliminate building a system around inefficient or broken processes;

  • Create system requirements to meet business objectives;

  • Participate in software selection to ensure requirements can be met;

  • Define a roll out strategy for the organization to build team confidence and staff buy-in;

  • Advocate for the facility for enhancements, testing and implementation;

  • Evaluate team performance to ensure the right tools are in place for team success.

Process Documentation and Redesign

A large part of software selection is the understanding of current business practices, which practices can be improved with technology, which may be eliminated for efficiency and what the new process should look like with proper system support.

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Understanding and documentation of current business processes most often brings forward existing inefficiency or resource burden processes and leads to defined system requirements that will lead to more productivity and proficiency in performing daily or routine tasks.

User Acceptance Testing (UAT) and Production Implementation

UAT of system functionality for new requirements, enhancements, bugs or fixes conducted by Caris provides full transparency to the system failures and successes prior to acceptance by the facility.  

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Testing, documentation and transfer of knowledge to facility staff is designed for successful system use.

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Software User Documentation

Many vendors provide outdated or not useful documentation for the software the software you have selected.  Many enhancements or alterations of functionality remains undocumented as the implementation project progresses.  Caris can provide the organization with user manual documentation that validates the system functionality and user responsibility.

Tips for Successful Implementation

  1. Hire Caris to be part of your team :)

  2. Agree on business objectives for new software

  3. Identify the right team members for project success

  4. Ensure processes for "Before Care", "During Care" and "After Care (aka Revenue Cycle)" are connected

  5. Ensure vendor relationship expectations are well defined in writing

  6. Pursue changes and enhancements that bring value to the organization

  7. Ensure there is transparency and knowledge transfer to stakeholders and users

  8. Allow time for testing and redefinition if necessary

  9. Document the system functionality for future reference

  10. Measure the success often against original business objectives to ensure project is on course

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