HOUSTON – The processes of coding and charge capture are often complicated, time-consuming, paper-intensive tasks more suited to administrators than clinicians.
To make those tasks easier for everyone involved, the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center is implementing the Infusion Services Model from MedAptus, a Boston-based provider of point-of-care charge capture technologies. The automated system allows nurses to enter infusion services delivered, after which the software translates the input into compliant codes.
Lori English, associate director of patient business services at M.D. Anderson, said the process now – in which nurses charge infusion services rendered and determine codes – is complicated, confusing and inconsistent, leading to inaccurate results and lost time and money. The Infusion Services Module, she said, “allows for a much greater degree of accuracy (and) consistency in interpretation.”
“We’re a huge installation and have so many varieties (of healthcare delivery). Everybody does things their own way,” she added.
M.D. Anderson, one of the world’s top-ranked comprehensive cancer care centers, is currently training about 120 nurses on the new system, which English expects to go live next month.
“The nurses are really, really anxious,” she said.
M.D. Anderson will be rolling out the desktop-based technologies to eight infusion centers, in which more than 100 nurses deliver more than 200 infusions each day. The solutions will include dashboard reconciliation functionality, allowing for further streamlining of charge review, approval and transmission processes. In addition, M.D. Anderson will be able to use MedAptus’ Cross Reconciliation Engine, which allows for data analysis of entered charges to identify overlooked opportunities.
Following that implementation, M.D. Anderson will roll out MedAptus’ Facility Charge Capture platform, which is the base for the Facility Charge Capture module, to more than 25 departments that deliver outpatient services. With Facility Charge Capture, officials plan to manage all technical charges, from collaborative capture at point-of-care to reconciliation, coding and compliance tasks in the back office.
The two solutions are add-ons to MedAptus’ Professional Charge Capture technology suite, which M.D. Anderson has been using since 2005. They’re designed to automate the usual paper-based processes of coding and point-of-care charge capture, streamlining and improving the workflow and giving healthcare providers less administrative duties and more time to spend with patients.
More than 700 healthcare providers at M.D. Anderson now use Professional Charge Capture. A study undertaken by the center indicates that tool has saved the center at least $7 million since its implementation.
“Given M.D. Anderson’s success in achieving enterprise-wide adoption of Professional Charge Capture with highly demonstrable results, deployment of Facility Charge Capture in concert with the Infusion Services Module will leverage and extend these gains in ambulatory services areas enterprise-wide,” said David Delaney, MD, MedAptus’ chief medical officer. “Also of utmost importance is that these technologies will greatly diminish time-consuming administrative overhead for busy clinical staff.”