Medical IT System Types
Departmental System – serves only one department or domain
Hospital-wide System – bring together systems of all departments
Enterprise System – brings together multiple providers and locations
External System – shared by multiple organizations to report data to regulatory agencies or for regional health networks
IT Project Management
Project Managers:
- Do review staff performance
- Do set schedules
- Do allocate resources
- Do NOT set your pay rate
Work Types
Parallel: each worker does several tasks
Serial: each worker does a variety of tasks in a workflow
Unit Assembly: each worker does a single task, but not necessarily in an ordered workflow.
Unilateral: NOT a real work type, but a red herring
Organization Hierarchy
BOD
President
Staffing Coordinator
Billing Coordinator
Office Manager
Staff
Methods of Operation
Customs and practices used to achieve the goal of the organization
Scope of Work
The tasks involved in accomplishing goals.
Resource Types
Financial resources, including third-party payers like insurance or the government
Human resources
Payments
Provider Type is the service or occupation group of the practitioner.
Customary Charges are the “normal” or reasonable charges usually applied.
Sliding Scale fees, on the other hand, are based on the patient’s ability to pay.
Fee for Service is essentially payment for treatment, rather than payment by diagnosis
Capitulation is the rate charged “per capita” – per individual – in a group plan. Formally, it’s the monthly payment an insurance company sends to a provider as set by an annual capitation contract. The services a patient uses do not determine capitation payments (at least in this year’s contract).
An Indemnity Plan enables the insured to visit any doctor or facility and direct his own care.
A Point of Service plan allows the patient to choose a provider each time healthcare service is required.
The Patient Admission Process
This is Registration or Admitting, but it is NOT Intake!
Name, address, contacts, insurance info, next of kin, allergies, medications, prior conditions, etc.
Order of Operations
Procedure or service
Dictation of record
Transcription
Coding
Billing
Budgets
Operating Budge – forecasts the costs of operations, for instance employees, supplies and leases
Statistical Budget – forecasts future volume of operations by analyzing statistical/historical data
Master Budget – brings together the budgets for all business or operating units
Organizational Budget – perhaps a real thing in other contexts, but a red herring here
Planning Chart Types
Gantt Chart – horizontal lines
Venn Diagram – a red herring – a mathematical diagram representing all possible relations between finite data sets
PERT Diagram – a sequence represented by circles connected by lines
Critical Path –
Bedside Medication Verification
- Scan patient wristband,
- medication barcode, and
- staff ID
Preventive Services
- Wellness visits
- Screening diagnostics
- Routine checkups
Filing Systems
Motorized revolving files: for very limited space in low-volume offices with one file clerk. Expensive to buy and maintain.
Filing cabinets with drawers: for small, low-volume facilities. Lockable/fireproof but big.
Compressible units with open files: for limited-space, medium-volume operations with 2-3 file clerks.
Open shelf files: for high-volume operations in which the presence of multiple filing staff provides (some) security. Less secure and bulky but fast.
Thinning is reducing a patient’s physical file for ease of handling. Excess papers are sent to be archived.
Document Management
Device Capture – transmitting info directly from a medical device such as an echocardiogram
Document Archiving – ensuring documents in a medical record are stored securely and for an appropriate period
Document Imaging – scanning and indexing paper documents into an electronic system
Clinical Imaging – info in photographs or other imaging devices