AdvancedMD Implementation Tips

AdvancedMD implementation is relatively straightforward by comparison to other EHRs. However, it still requires planning and well-directed execution. 

AdvancedMD is fairly easy to implement by comparison to many other EHRs. However, nothing ever is *that* easy. I have seen this error time and again - practices purchase the EHR and simply plunge themselves into go-live, only to face chaos and confusion after. 

As in many things, the middle way, or moderation, is the best course. No, you don't need an army of consultants documenting every workflow and training every group of users; however, you should also not jump into day 1 of go-live without any preparation at all. 

How to achieve the middle way? A few tips:

#1 Develop appropriate clinical templates

By now, AdvancedMD has supplied its users with a fairly comprehensive set of templates ranging from primary care to wound care to cardiology to imaging. So you don't have to reinvent the wheel. However, you must review each and every template you are planning on using, click your way through it, and make sure it satisfies your needs. 

In addition, understand the ways to make additions to a template. You can make edits to the template itself, you can develop a focused sub-note to plug into it, or you can try to find another template in the library. 

You should also think about the "Narrative" portion. How would you like your note to be printed out? For what purpose? Do you need a summary to hand out to the patient? Do you need an all-inclusive printout to give to the insurance? 

#2 Understand the roles of your users

By and large, you need to determine: a) Who will be filling out patient notes; b) Who will be signing the notes; c) Who will be creating and signing charge slips; d) Who will be submitting claims; d) Who will be registering patients; e) Who will be scheduling patients; f) Who will be checking patients in, verifying insurance, and collecting co-pays. The answer to these questions will determine who needs to learn what and the kind of training groups you should form. If your clinical users will not be selecting procedure codes, there is no need to teach them about charge slips. If your billers are not expected to submit a charge slip from a clinical note, there is no need to train them on using the EHR.  

#3 Understand your billing monitoring tools

AdvancedMD has many useful tools for the management of billing and back-end revenue cycle. However, the challenge as with all EHRs is to make sure that nothing falls through the cracks. You must understand how to establish a system by which you have visibility into every AR balance, every unbilled visit, every denial, and every rejected claim. AdvancedMD offers many tools to assist you in this, but you need to chart a path and determine which ones to use. Will you be using the end-of-day reconciliation process, or will you use exception reports created in Analytics? I personally prefer to develop dashboards in Analytics that show me my net collection rate and my open AR balances, which then allow me to drill down into the balances I need to review. 

#4 Develop reports

 While you can go live without adequate reporting, this will become necessary very quickly. You need complete visibility into your production, volume, expected collections, and provider productivity, as well as your billing efficiency. The best tool to employ, as we explained in another piece, is Analytics. But you can also rely on data extracts such as the "Financial Detail" report if you are an Excel warrior. 

Many clients that we work with begin every week with a dashboard in analytics that allows them to look back into the previous week's performance, and look forward into the coming week's forecasted performance.  

#5 Use a third-party consultant

This may sound self-serving, but hey, this has been an industry best practice since I began consulting 17 years ago. You will achieve much better results if you manage the implementation through a third-party consultant and not the vendor, or your own IT department.  This is true for Epic implementations, CRM systems, and pretty much any complex enterprise system. Even with the best intentions, the vendor will lack the visibility or attention to your specific processes, and your internal staff, unless they are very familiar with the EHR from previous jobs, will lack the experience needed for the implementation. Ultimately this saves much frustration and funds and reduces the need for continuous optimization.  

For questions regarding AdvancedMD consulting and AdvancedMD implementation assistance, feel free to contact us.