Explore: EMR Usability

Now that Meaningful Use money is up for grabs, almost every U.S. hospital is somewhere down the pathway to deploying at least a Stage 1-certified EMR.  Once installed, the tab on many of these systems can run as high as nine figures. For that kind of coin, every user in every department should see their daily workflow improve dramatically. Yet industry-wide physician adoption of hospital EMR systems continues to fall short of expectations.

For many users, the source of frustration is the clinical documentation system they’re asked to use. In theory, these tools are designed to make physicians’ lives easier. But too many documentation systems compromise the usability of the EMR for its most important users.

Not surprisingly, physicians resist changing the way they work to use tools that don’t solve their daily challenges. They stick with familiar workflows – even cumbersome tools such as pen and paper – to capture the details of patient encounters. And they leave it to the hospital to figure out how to extract the data they need.

The net result: physicians end up engaging with the EMR as minimally as possible. Without timely and comprehensive involvement from a significant percentage of physicians, an EMR system cannot help hospitals achieve their clinical, financial and operational improvement goals.

Achieve Physician-Friendly Documentation – Today and Tomorrow – with Salar

Workflow flexibility is crucial to achieving user satisfaction. As the point of entry for most of the patient information found in the EMR, Salar gives physicians and hospitals the most customizable and user-friendly documentation tools on the market:

For Physicians:

• Salar makes contributing to the EMR faster and less stressful with electronic documentation tools that are satisfying to use

• Customizable user interface allows physicians to include only the documentation elements they need

• By removing unnecessary screens and extra clicks, physicians save time while capturing more detailed and comprehensive information for every patient

• Significantly reduce your daily documentation burden by automatically integrating daily observations, labs, pharmacy, vital signs and other clinical data into your notes

• Increase revenue by automatically capturing ICD-9/10 codes at the point of care

For the CIO/IT:

• Improve EMR usability and achieve broad physician adoption with integrated, user-friendly electronic documentation and billing solutions

• Flexible documentation platform lets physicians customize the note interface while facilitating the collection of structured data

• Unlock significant clinical, financial and productivity improvements by driving billing, patient handoff, PQRS collection and other activities from the clinical note

• Compliance with HL7 CDA data integration standards supports Meaningful Use and quality improvement initiatives

• Achieve a Stage 7 EMR by allowing every clinical document to be immediately accessible

For HIM and Finance:

• Capture complete, legible, comprehensive documentation with tools that prioritize an efficient, user-friendly physician workflow

• Implement a computer-assisted coding workflow that saves time by helping physicians identify ICD-9/10 codes at the point of care

• Streamline coding, query and review by ensuring every note is available in the EMR the moment it’s authored

• Achieve continual documentation improvement with flexible solutions that facilitate fast, accurate communication between physicians and HIM