What is an Electronic Health Record (EHR)?
An electronic health record (EHR) is a digitized version of a patient’s medical records. They are designed to update in real-time, making them accessible to healthcare providers from any time and place, provided the practitioner is an authorized user. Amongst other features, EHRs typically contain medical history, diagnoses, treatments, medications, and laboratory results. The updated combination of this type of information allows healthcare providers to be fully informed prior to making any treatment decisions, meaning that their patients are much more likely to experience positive outcomes. Additionally, EHRs have been designed to be used by healthcare providers across a wide range of departments and facilities, streamlining communication and greatly improving coordination of care. This ability to share critical information is revolutionizing the healthcare industry by ensuring every healthcare provider involved in a patient’s care has access to the necessary information. The best EHR software will integrate into the systems that your practice already has in place, making it extremely easy to get started. Finding which of these systems will best suit your business can be a time-consuming process - but that’s where we can help. If you’re interested in narrowing down your search and identifying the perfect EHR solution for you, then you’ve come to the right place!
Using EHR Healthcare - For a better, connected care
Adapting to new systems and tools for healthcare businesses can be a daunting experience, particularly if you are used to things working a certain way. Nevertheless, as EHRs have become increasingly popular, the healthcare industry has seen a correlation between this usage and better, connected care.
Accuracy: All healthcare practitioners are required to write documentation, which is consequently used for a range of processes, including making diagnoses and submitting claims. Using EHR software to write this documentation minimizes the risk of illegible handwriting or spelling mistakes. Additionally, EHRs can alert users to any identified errors within their system. This means that the information recorded is much more accurate, and practitioners are able to make better-informed decisions, leading to positive health outcomes.
Efficiency: Healthcare practitioners are busy people, who often struggle to find the time to complete necessary tasks. By implementing EHRs, you will be able to streamline all of your documentation, freeing up time for other important tasks.
Communication: Establishing effective communication is extremely important in healthcare, and can be largely assisted by EHRs. With the right system, healthcare providers can share information across departments and facilities, elevating communication and improving coordination of care.
Patient access: One of the biggest issues facing patient medical charts is a lack of access. EHRs have been designed to combat this by being accessible to patients at all times, contributing to better transparency and allowing patients to play a more involved role in managing their own care.
Benefits of using EHR in a healthcare business
Both clinical and administrative staff needs to be familiar with the systems in place at their practice. Whilst adjusting to new software can take a little time, there are specific advantages for healthcare businesses when it comes to using electronic patient records that are hard to ignore.
Medication management: Attempting to streamline medication management can be dangerous, given the risks of over-or under-prescribing for patients. With EHR, prescriptions can be managed more securely, as information is updated in real-time and shared between all relevant healthcare providers. As we mentioned before, best EMR for solo practice systems can also reduce the risk of errors, ensuring that prescriptions are as accurate as possible.
Security: The healthcare industry handles a lot of PHI (protected health information), and reasonable security measures need to be applied to ensure it is kept secure. Many people worry that using electronic systems like EHR will put confidential information at the risk of hackers or data leaks, but this isn’t necessarily the case. The data stored on electronic patient records are encrypted at all times and have additional digital security measures that work as fantastic safeguards. Storing information electronically also minimizes the risk of losing or damaging documentation as a result of theft or natural disasters.
Accessibility: We have already spoken about how EHRs are accessible to patients at all times, and this also applies to practitioners. As more and more healthcare providers are beginning to work remotely, it is essential that they can access critical information from anywhere. Provided they are an authorized user, EHRs can be accessed by healthcare practitioners from any time or place, allowing them to work on the go.
Top EHR softwares that medical practitioners can adopt in their practice
So now you know all about the benefits of EHR systems, it’s time to look at your options. Thankfully, the popularity of this type of software has led to its increased development, meaning there are plenty of suitable solutions for your healthcare business. We have compiled a list of some of the top EHR options, including their specific tools and features.
Carepatron: Carepatron offers a highly sophisticated EHR system that has been designed in collaboration with healthcare providers to elevate the efficiency and organization of your business. In addition to managing documentation, the EHR is integrated with appointment scheduling, online payments, medical billing, and a patient portal, making it one of the best software for patient communication.
Advanced MD: AdvancedMD offers an EHR system that is well suited to larger healthcare practices. It includes a wide range of different features that your business can choose from depending on its specific needs, as well as standard telehealth tools, documentation storage, and note-taking features. The price of AdvancedMD differs depending on what package you require, as many of their add-on features include extra costs. One of the best advantages of AdvancedMD is the complementary training program that will teach you and your staff how to navigate the system, ensuring its installation is smooth and efficient.
DrChrono: DrChrono is a fairly affordable EHR option well suited to new healthcare businesses. It is integrated with appointment scheduling, medical billing, and patient reminders, allowing you to streamline various administrative tasks. The different packages for DrChrono come in tiers, and you can select which option works best for you depending on your needs. Unfortunately, this system doesn’t integrate with certain lab providers so you must check whether this will impact your practice before making a decision.
Greenway Health: Greenway Health integrates its practice management software with its EHR, helping healthcare businesses to boost their efficiency and organization in various fields. It is on the more expensive side for an EHR, but this is largely due to its exceptional customization features. Greenway Health uses a system called Intergy, which caters its software to your specific healthcare specialty. These features make it well suited to a variety of different fields, allowing you to manage your workflow, documentation, and security from a single platform.
Trust Carepatron to meet your EHR software needs
When it comes to choosing the right software for your business, it can be tricky navigating the many different available options. If you are after an easy-to-use, sophisticated and secure system, then look no further than Carepatron. Carepatron’s EHR system is integrated with appointment scheduling, clinical documentation, a patient portal, medical billing, and practice management software for healthcare businesses. These features will allow your practice to put its best foot forward and greatly improve internal efficiency and organization. Additionally, Carepatron cares about the safety of you and your clients. It is a HIPAA-compliant platform that processes all information through layers of AES-256 encryption, guaranteeing protection from data hacks or external threats. The team at Carepatron have worked hard to ensure that this software is suitable for a wide range of different healthcare fields, and they are available to you 24/7 if you require any assistance. By choosing to go with Carepatron, you are not only going to see improved organization within your healthcare practice, but your patients will also reap the benefits of better coordination of care and improved clinical outcomes. What’s not to love!
One simple EHR for your entire team: Try Carepatron for free today!
Further Reading:
