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The doctor-patient relationship has endured a transition in the last two decades. The paternalistic model of the doctor-patient relationship the healthcare industry has been witnessing needs a transformation; the physician dominance should be reduced to foster more mutual participation. “In most businesses, we are treated as consumers, and everything is designed to provide a top-notch experience. However, when it comes to healthcare, the reality is different. Patients are treated as somebody who needs a doctor whereas the doctor doesn’t need them. Patients need to be treated as consumers, ensuring that they are satisfied and have a smooth experience at any level of interaction,” says Arman Samani, CTO of AdvancedMD. Steering ahead with a vision that patient retention and referral rates can be increased by improving patient satisfaction, AdvancedMD has designed advanced patient engagement solutions that streamline the patient’s check-in process to enhance clinical efficiency and quality of care.
“The days of calling the front desk at a doctor’s office or care-giving organization for an appointment are long gone— patients can now schedule their medical appointments online with a few clicks via their laptop or phone,” exclaims Samani. A revolutionary cloud-based electronic health record (EHR) platform launched recently by AdvancedMD—Rhythm, enables healthcare organizations to provide better service to the consumers. Rhythm is an all-in-one patient engagement suite that works in tandem with their practice management and EHR to generate specialty-driven workflows within the platform, suitable for specialists in diverse branches of medicine.
Besides the unified practice management and EHR platform, the company considers lifestyle management to be one of their key propositions. “Currently, ongoing lifestyle management for a patient is severely undermined,” reveals Samani. “Treatments mostly commence after a patient experiences symptoms of a chronic disease— there is not a focus on preventing the disease.” AdvancedMD focuses on disease prevention through active and continuous lifestyle management rather than helping caregivers and their staff attempt to cure the disease in the chronic stage. One of the major reasons behind this, as highlighted by Samani, is that doctors and practices are not paid for the service; both the patients as well as the caregivers would be motivated in availing the services in case of any short-term incentives.
“Payment for lifestyle management could lead to a major positive shift in the healthcare space,” says Samani.
Patients need to be treated as consumers, ensuring that they are satisfied and have a smooth experience at any level and interaction
The uniqueness of the solutions offered by AdvancedMD lies in its plug-and-play approach. “Our Rhythm platform is very easy to implement,” states Samani. The company’s reputation management solutions allow doctors to manage their reputation and receive reviews online. These doctors can be found if somebody searches online, and the reviews can be read online. “We offer solutions for online scheduling that eliminates the need to call the front desk to schedule an appointment. The objective is to make all services available to patients with just a click with any mobile device,” says Samani. Besides, AdvancedMD online billing statements, online medical history forms, along with automated appointment reminders—both voice and written—have helped independent doctors achieve a better online reputation, while saving the patients valuable time. To elaborate, one AdvancedMD client saw a 20 percent increase in new patient appointments once they implemented online scheduling, including consent forms, and appointment times were also significantly reduced. Having made its presence known in all regions throughout the United States, AdvancedMD plans to focus on the development of technologically advanced microservices architecture. “We are working on continual delivery improvements via the Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD) System and hope to continue to lead in the private practice space, as the leading reputation and lifestyle management company,” concludes Samani.
Company
AdvancedMD
Management
Raul Villar, CEO, AdvancedMD
Description
AdvancedMD is a healthcare technology company that offers cloud medical office software to ambulatory medical practices. The company supports independent physicians and their staff with a comprehensive suite of solutions, including practice management, electronic health records, telemedicine, patient relationship management, business analytics reporting, and physician-performance benchmarking. AdvancedMD offers a flexible outsourced billing option for practices looking to use a third-party billing company. AdvancedMD serves an expansive national footprint of more than 26,000 practitioners across 8,600 practices and 600 medical billing companies. Nearly 3.5M insurance claims are processed monthly on the AdvancedMD billing platform
AdvancedMD News
AdvancedMD rolls out new automation and payment capabilities to help private practices increase productivity and drive more revenue
Chief among the product updates is the newly released revolutionary Certified PAX A920 credit card processing terminal. The terminal seamlessly connects to the AdvancedMD Pay system, the company’s all-in-one healthcare payment processing platform that allows private practices to collect credit card payments in-person and online, enabling a fully unified revenue cycle management strategy. During the initial rollout, the credit card processing terminals will be available by invitation to existing AdvancedMD Pay clients and then extended to all clients.
In addition to the AdvancedMD Pay terminal, the AdvancedMD Pay platform can now process payment plans through the AdvancedMD Patient Billing Wizard for patients who have a credit card on file. It can also capture and disburse insurance virtual credit card (VCC) payments, enabling practices to process a VCC in the Payment Entry—all in a single transaction. The AdvancedMD explanation of benefits allows healthcare providers and their admin teams to distribute a payment to many patients and monitor how much of the VCC payment remains.
According to a recent poll from the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA), more than a third of the medical groups surveyed automate less than 20% of their revenue cycle operations. Meanwhile, when asked what areas they plan to automate or outsource this year, one in five medical group owners said the “revenue cycle” elements of their practice.
“Health providers and private practice owners are up against a myriad of challenges when it comes to establishing successful revenue cycle management strategies. Claim denials, low reimbursement rates, late patient payments, and more can have a massive impact on a practice’s financial stability. That’s why we’re so excited about the launch of our credit card processing terminal that enables practices to easily accept in-person payments via a device that seamlessly integrates with the AdvancedMD Pay platform,” said Tim Costantino, VP and Head of Product, AdvancedMD. “It’s one of the many ways AdvancedMD is helping our customers by providing best-in-class payment solutions that drive more efficient, and more profitable, workflow processes. With this latest release, we are raising the bar on practice management, EHR, and patient engagement capabilities so that our customers have the tools they need to build a thriving practice.”
In addition to the launch of the AdvancedMD Pay terminal and updates, the practice management, EHR, and patient engagement sides of the platform also received a number of new features.
Practice Management Updates:
• The Carrier Update tool now allows admins to update multiple carriers simultaneously, making mass updates quick and easy.
• Automated payment terms for cancellations and no-shows, enabling multiple charges with different charge amounts so that practices have the flexibility to change a fee based on whether it’s a no-show or cancellation. AdvancedMD customers can easily track patients who frequently miss appointments and close the documentation loop by adding a note and a charge slip within the EHR.
• AdvancedMD customers can now perform a partial write-off via the Mass Write-off feature, and the Fee Schedule Import tool also has been enhanced: instead of receiving an error when trying to import a file containing CPT codes that don’t exist in their office key, AdvancedMD customers will get a warning. The warning helps save time, eliminating the need to manually remove missing codes—instead, the import can be completed with all other fees from the file belonging to CPT codes in use.
EHR Updates:
• AdvancedMD has included a variety of enhancements to its ePrescribing feature based on client feedback, including more filtering and sorting options for the eSend status screen, new search capabilities for pharmacies and medications, a prescriber list that only shows prescribers who can eSend when writing a prescription, and more.
• The ability to review dispensed medications by the pharmacy and evaluate medication adherence, making it easier to evaluate data for patients who are non-compliant.
• More streamlined electronic case reporting capabilities: practices can automatically send patient case reports directly from AdvancedMD EHR to state public health agencies, without disrupting clinical workflows.
Patient Engagement Updates:
• More granular visibility into patient form management to improve operational transparency and patient care assessments: practices can see who assigned and/or approved a specific patient form.
• Increased administrative controls and user-level security for appointment reminder templates: admins are now able to limit who can edit the templates. There are also new role privileges under the “User Management” settings for Automated Messaging & Reminders. When the setting is disabled for any user, they will not be able to edit those templates.
• Time zone enhancements in the scheduler make it easier to schedule appointments for patients living in different time zones than the medical practice. This update enables a more seamless process for setting and managing appointments. This feature is available throughout all AdvancedMD products, including its mobile apps.