Doctor Tips

HL7 is a standard for the exchange, integration, sharing, and retrieval of electronic health information between healthcare providers, patients, and other stakeholders in the healthcare industry. While an HL7 bridge has many advantages for exchanging health information, it may not be the best option for downloading changes to a doctor’s appointment calendar for the following reasons:

1. Complexity: HL7 is a complex standard with many options and features, and implementing it can be challenging. It may not be the best option for simple use cases such as downloading changes to a doctor’s appointment calendar.
2. Overhead: HL7 is designed to support complex workflows and multiple systems exchanging health information. It has a lot of overhead, including message headers, message footers, and other metadata that may not be necessary for downloading changes to a doctor’s appointment calendar.
3. Latency: HL7 messages can be large, and exchanging them can take time. Downloading changes to a doctor’s appointment calendar requires low latency and high availability to ensure that the calendar is always up-to-date.
4. Security: HL7 messages may contain sensitive patient information, and securing them can be challenging. Downloading changes to a doctor’s appointment calendar may not require the same level of security, and other simpler options may be available.
5. Cost: The initial and ongoing costs associated with building the software and infrastructure to enable healthcare interoperability HL7 internally can be substantial.
6. Time To Market:  Building healthcare integrations can be time-consuming and can shift your organization’s focus from innovating to integrating.
7. Reliability: DoctorConnect’s integration tools have proven to be more reliable and fault tolerant than changes relayed over an HL7 bridge.  DoctorConnect has been a pioneer in the development of reliable, secure integration tools for over 15 years
8. Support:  Since we don’t depend on a new technology layer – DoctorConnect is able to quickly make changes to meet your clinics changing needs and goals.  We are able to quickly diagnose and correct any issues that may arise to keep your operation running seamlessly.

Therefore, while HL7 has many advantages for exchanging health information, it may not be the best option for integrating with a patient engagement service. DoctorConnect strongly suggests using simpler, more reliable options such as using a FIHR API, a vendor API, automated macros or a simple database queries to achieve your patient engagement goals.  These methods are low-overhead, low-maintenance, and highly reliable ways to interface with your EMR.

Contact us today to discuss your options and schedule a quick demo of our tools.

Several healthcare providers have switched to telehealth, but still, many patients continue to require in-person care. Zero-contact approaches are thus critically needed for patient safety against COVID 19 in health care settings.

With zero contact patient intake solutions patients can complete a medical intake form with their health history, lifestyle, and more—from their home or other locations where they feel safer from the risk of crowded waiting rooms. 

The mobility advantage of such patient intake solutions can also empower medical staff to handle patient registration remotely without physically dealing with paperwork, insurance cards, credit cards, and ID cards.

Zero contact workflow enables practical social distancing without impacting patient care. It limits exposure by reducing in-person interactions in the clinical setting. Here are the top three reasons to implement zero contact in healthcare facilities:

1. It is paperless and peerless

Vaccines alone are not enough in the protection of COVID 19. Social distancing and other safety regulations may need to be adhered to for a long time to come before attaining herd immunity.

The spread of the pandemic represents a major challenge for clinical staff. The frontline staff who interact with each patient that walks in– even before they are screened for COVID-19–are at a higher risk.

The six-foot rule is only useful where there is zero contact with individuals. However, in-clinical care settings are regularly inundated by patient crowds and the physical handling of forms and payment cards.

There are many instances when patients may need to see their medical care specialists in person. Thus, providers need effective and tested measures to guarantee zero-contact without compromising patient care.

It is fundamentally critical to keep implementing and using contactless patient registration and medical staff collaboration tools along these lines. 

Contactless patient intake means lesser paper and better patient safety against COVID 19.

Zero-contact healthcare workflow disposes of paper in all patient interactions and makes it easier to gather patient data, including COVID-19 tests, without risking patients or front desk staff.

Further, zero-contact health center workflows can be the key to streamlining payments and ensuring profitability. 

With self-check-in, patients get to enter their payment card details to make payments directly. Apart from reducing the risk of contracting the virus, the upfront payment approach minimizes the risk of bad debt.

2. Digital, mobile and fast

Zero contact clinical workflows enable digital check-in by patients. Implementing this enables your patients to register with the convenience of standardized tags and QR codes. 

There are zero tags, forms, clipboards, and personal contact on the process. Patients can register and make payments from the comfort of their homes, cars, or other places.

Even if the patients do not complete the entire registration process from home, they can still fill the forms and make payments on their phones when they get to the clinic.

In such a self-check-in model, patients are not required to present a driver’s license or visa card to front desk staff. 

They can instead take a picture and upload it with their phones. This minimizes the risk of exposure to the COVID 19 virus while ensuring accurate data entry.

Providers can also better manage the healthcare environment, for instance, by asking patients to come at a specific time or wait in their cars until the doctor or nurse is ready to see them.

3. Manage patient anxiety

There is a lot of anxiety around COVID-19 in the general populace; patients may want to delay their checkups or emergency clinical visits because of the fear of sitting in a crowded waiting room. This fear is greater among those with pre-existing health vulnerabilities.

Zero-contact work workflows and digitization of the medical intake form reduce fear among patients and guarantee limited crowd exposure. Communicating to patients about COVID safety measures like this can help reduce patient fear, panic, and anxiety around health center visits so they can get the necessary care when they need it.

By implementing zero-contact patient intake, patients only have to visit the doctor at the exact time of the appointment instead of waiting in the reception area.

Suppose there is a suspected case of a COVID 19 patient. In that case, medical staff can efficiently analyze the risk intensity and discuss options, including rescheduling, telehealth, and stringent protective measures before the patient’s arrival.

In summary

When in-person treatment is required, safeguarding your patients and staff is critical. That is why contactless workflow processes are essential to eliminate direct contact among patients and staff during the registration process.

With contactless patient intake, your facility can build patient confidence by ensuring a zero-contact registration and payment experience while allowing staff to handle patient intakes digitally with minimal risk.

Patients can pre-register from anyplace to avoid crowding in the waiting areas. Medical professionals can operate much more efficiently and safely without having to handle cards and registration forms.

Zero contact workflow is one of the critical approaches that healthcare providers need to protect patients and staff and minimize the spread of the coronavirus. Additional benefits include speed, patient data accuracy, efficiency, and productivity.

Would you like to experience the rewarding benefits of a zero-contact workflow solution in your clinic? Request a free demo at https://doctorconnect.net.