Best Practices for Improving Operational Performance of Healthcare Providers

Technology has raised performance metrics for everyone and healthcare providers are no exception. It has equally affected medical practitioners who now greatly depend on health information technology for most of the clinical tasks. However, these fully computerized healthcare facilities have raised the bar for quality and the operational performance of employees. Visit this URL to learn more about how practices can improve operational performance.

Organizations are encouraging healthcare workers to experience the benefits their overall productivity will have with the use of healthcare technologies. Optimum levels of operational performance require them working at par with their computers and produce the best results. Healthcare providers are concerned about productivity and efficiency due to various reasons.

• Healthcare providers want to benefit from government incentives and affiliate programs by providing quality of care.
• Ratings and self-accountability are pushing organizations to deliver their best; otherwise, a subsequent cut to their earnings will be incurred.
• Patient-centered healthcare systems require the satisfaction of their patients.
• Due to enhanced integration and automation of clinical tasks, the negligence of one can affect others.
• Efficient clinical workflow achieved through proper use of health information technologies.
• Handling a maximum number of patients in the shortest possible time and with more accuracy.
• Saving costs by complying with best practices.
• Avoiding medical errors by using the intuitive decision support system.

Technology adoption can have its downside as well. It is generally assumed that switching to an electronic healthcare system initially disrupts the practice; affecting performance and efficiency. The adoption of an electronic practice management system does not guarantee quality improvement. Many adopters found that adoption was quite similar to taking one step forward and two steps back in their practice. Best practices, however, can improve operational performance and quality of healthcare.

A form of best practice is a well-maintained electronic system, which improves access to health information, speeding up communication between doctor and patient. A couple of benefits for the patient; they can decide on their appointment time and correspond with their provider via a messaging system.

Healthcare providers should exploit the best use of medical practice management tools. The integration and automation of all departments at a healthcare facility increase efficiency. Here are a few tips to improve the operational performance of medical practices.

• Map the patient's walkthrough and other clinical processes and identify areas to improve.
• Optimize your scheduling, reduce wait time and utilize maximize time slots of the physicians.
• Spare specific time to check emails and handle the correspondence and never invest your busy hours in such tasks.
• Define roles and user-specific responsibilities and train your staff to follow standard operating procedures.
• Computerized physician order entry (CPOE) followed by electronic submission of lab results helps the physician reach a quick diagnosis.
• A well-structured decision support system (DSS) improves operational performance.
• Using an electronic health record system, physicians can now easily access health records, so implement electronic health records management system.
• Bring accuracy to clinical documentation and remove possibilities of errors.
• Partner with a healthcare technology company to get the best tools for your practice.
• Outsource billing to a professional medical billing company and set revenue targets.
• Take regular feedback from the client and redesign or optimize your workflow according to it.
• Automate processes and adopt clinical technologies to automate the processes.
• Utilize the pre-visit time to capture data from patients. Do not waste time in data entry during the actual visit by the patient.
• Scheduled visits according to the available slots of the physicians and never overbook for busy hours. 
• Make your processes scalable and flexible to adjust according to the requirement.
• Train your staff to improve operational performance and encourage them with incentives.
• Go paperless and seek out digital alternatives of the manual processes
• Search for redundant tasks and find solutions to them. Do not let important tasks fall through the cracks and forgotten.
• Keep an eye on the outcomes and make usability the prime objective.
• Take analytics and performance reports and perform periodic audits to identify problems.
• Improve coordination between your staff, remove constraints and do not let them block the workflow in silos.
• Engage patients in the care delivery process and let them handle their health records and enter information through patient portals.
• Make your clinical technologies mobile friendly and give the user-specific access on mobile devices.
• Implement tools and technologies that can integrate.
• Focus on patient retention and improving the patient experience.        

Training and support at every stage are crucial to maintaining performance. Only a well-trained staff can contribute to the success of an organization and allow them to work together as a team. Complete understanding of all the procedures imparts satisfaction and passion for work.

Adjust accordingly, update yourself and staff with policy changes, new laws and technologies. There is no alternative to a skilled and knowledgeable workforce, and in the present healthcare system, performance is dependent on a collective team effort.