If you’re a physician, odds are documentation consumes much of your workday. Too much. In fact, some studies estimate that paperwork, including dictation, can consume up to 40 percent of a doctor’s workday, significantly impacting the amount of time spent with patients and their own families. In Middle Tennessee, one company is working to correct that.
Brentwood-based Entrada Health is revolutionizing the field of documentation for physicians. Their unique mobile-documentation technology increases productivity for physicians while tightening integration with clinical electronic health records systems – a win-win for both practitioners and EHRs.Filling a Need“There are many government incentives to put into place systems that don’t necessarily talk well together, and that leaves gaps for companies to come in and help make things better,” said Bill Brown, CEO of Entrada Health. “Everything we do is predicated on driving extra time and letting doctors get charting done quicker and more accurately.”
Available on any smart phone or tablet, Entrada’s voice-recognition technology works with the provider’s EHR system to knock out the time-consuming, field-driven EHR tasks required for each patient. Physicians select the patient’s name on the app, and in one to two minutes vocally complete the otherwise lengthy fields. The patient’s quality of care could also be improved by the program’s ability to capture more robust details including a richer and more complete patient record. There’s an App for ThatIn 2014, Entrada added the ability to securely take and share photos from mobile devices. The app bypasses the standard camera feature on the phone or tablet and delivers the encrypted image directly into the patient’s record. Soon, secure messaging capabilities will let users send texts directly to the patient’s chart through Entrada’s messaging program or by tying into one of the 50-plus secure messaging companies already on the market. Deeper research and development efforts also are underway to identify ways to increase productivity and efficiency for caregivers and to become more highly integrative with current systems.
“While many EHR companies have their own mobile apps, much of the EHR software was written 20 years ago before implementation of Meaningful Use and ICD-10,” Brown said. “Smart phones have only been around for about seven years, so we’re on the front end of smart phone-based chart support and are still evolving.”A Friend to EHRsAnother homerun, Brown said, is that Entrada’s ease of use encourages doctors to utilize EHRs, increasing both sign-off rates and satisfaction with EHR providers. That’s a big plus for EHR companies, which are embracing Entrada as a high-tech partner. NextGen Healthcare Information Systems, athenahealth, Greenway and Allscripts all have launched partnerships with Entrada. The company also has rolled out a combined app with Ingenious Med, the nation’s leading patient encounter platform used by 25,000 providers. Those partnerships have helped account for the company’s double and triple revenue growth annually over the past four years.Orthopaedics & EntradaEntrada’s 120-plus clients represent nearly 15 specialties including a large subset of orthopaedic groups nationwide.
“Since our initial main platform includes dictation specific parts of a medical encounter, it appeals more toward medical specialists who see high volumes of patients and complicated cases,” Brown said. “Orthopaedics gravitated to Entrada early since ortho surgeons are so busy, and switching to an EHR can affect a practice’s productivity from the provider perspective.”
In 2013, Entrada added OrthoTennessee to its client list. OrthoTennessee physicians dictate with Entrada’s digital dictation solution via iPod Touches centrally managed through secure VPN connections. Administration also chose to deploy the devices for remote use only, ensuring full compliance with mandatory ordinances, as well as HIPAA regulations.
“Since Entrada’s mobile application runs on iPod Touches, our physicians were already so familiar with the iOS platform that it made adoption of this digital dictation solution very simple and easy,” remarked Karen Clark, chief information officer at OrthoTennessee.Maximizing EHRsBrown said one of the greatest challenges facing providers is deciding whether to move beyond status quo. Once the Meaningful Use dust has settled and an EHR system is adopted, practice managers must decide if they want to supplement the program with other tools to increase efficiency.
“Entrada plays a role as a consultant to a lot of these groups,” Brown said. “The key from the product efficiency standpoint is finding the right workflow into how a company does business. What we try to do is understand the workflow solution that will best accommodate their practice.”
While increased EHR use is beneficial across the healthcare spectrum, Brown said Entrada’s greatest offering is the quality of life value proposition offered to physicians. Shortly after implementing Entrada for a San Antonio orthopaedic group, Brown received a very encouraging call. In just six weeks, the technology had cut nearly three days off their clinic time.
“We go in and talk to these surgeons who were forgoing family dinner or couldn’t attend their kid’s soccer practice because of the extra hours required every evening to complete documentation,” Brown said. “We’re focused on doctors and improving quality of life for this segment of the population.”
