Please respond to this Discussion> Include a reference please
Please respond to this Discussion> Include a reference please
As identified in the Wasatch Family Clinic Case Study , there are several clinical and administrative processes that could use improvement. These include scheduling patients, checking patients in, ordering laboratory tests, submitting prescriptions to pharmacies, ordering office supplies, billing insurance companies, and more. Separate IT solutions could be implemented for each of the processes. However, you know that if you could combine these into an enterprise system, you would be able to significantly improve the operations of Wasatch Family Clin(attac below is the case study)
- What opportunities would be missed if each area (scheduling, check-in, supply ordering, billing, etc.) maintained its own “stove piped” data? Provide some examples.
- What benefits will the Wasatch Family Clinic realize if you implement an enterprise-wide system? Identify how Dr. Ute as the overall owner and manager will benefit from having additional information available.
- What types of decisions that he makes would be improved if he had all this information in one place?
IFSM 305 CASE STUDY PROJECTWASATCH FAMILY MEDICAL CLINIC CASE STUDY BACKGROUNDIn 1980, the Wasatch Family Medical Clinic was opened in a growing family areanear the Wasatch Mountains in northern Utah by Dr. Thomas Ute after he retiredfrom the US Navy.WFMC is a small Family Medicine medical practice.Dr. Ute has been the owner and manager of the medical practice since its inception.He has two nurses, Vivian and Andrea, to help him.Usually, one nurse takes care ofthe front desk while the other nurse assists the doctor during the patient visits.Thenurses rotate duties each day.Front desk duties include all administrative work including answering the phone,scheduling appointments, taking prescription re±ll requests, billing, faxing, and soon.If Vivian is helping the doctor on Monday, then it is Andrea who takes care ofthe front desk and all o²ce work. Then, on Tuesday, Andrea will help the doctor andVivian will take care of the front desk and o²ce management work.The two nurses are constantly busy and running around, and patients are nowaccustomed to a minimum 1-2 hour wait before being seen by the doctor.If onenurse is absent, the situation is even worse in the clinic.Currently, the clinic has three examination rooms, and Dr. Ute is now looking intobringing a new physician or nurse practitioner on board.This would help him growhis practice, provide better service to his patients, and possibly reduce the patients’waiting time.Dr. Ute knows that this will increase the administrative overhead, andthe two nurses will not be able to manage any additional administrative work.05/15/2017IFSM 305 – Case StudyPage | 1
Because he faces several challenges and cannot aFord to hire any additional o±cestaF, Dr. Ute has to optimize his administrative and clinical operations.The practiceis barely covering the expenses and salaries at the moment.Dr. Ute’s practice operation is all paper-based.Paper medical records ²ll his fronto±ce shelves. The only software the doctor has on his front o±ce computer is astand-alone appointment scheduling system.Billing insurance companies is done in a mostly manual way.To bill an insurancecompany, the front o±ce nurse must send via ³AX all the needed documentation toa third party medical billing company at the end of the day.The medical billingcompany then submits the claim to the insurance company and bills the patient.The clinic checks the status of the claims by logging into the medical billing system,through a login that the medical billing company has provided the clinic to accessits account.There is no billing software installed at the practice, but the nursesopen Internet Explorer to the URL of the medical billing company.They then usethe login provided by the third party medical billing company.Of course, themedical billing company takes a percentage of the amount that the clinic isreimbursed by the insurance.Although the medical practice has one desktop PCwith the scheduling software and an Internet connection, it does not have a websiteor any other technology, and essentially still operates the same way it did in 1980.One problem that is immediately noticeable is that there is no quick way to checkpatients in for their appointments.If the nurse assigned to o±ce duties is on thephone while a patient tries to check in, then the patient has to wait until she hascompleted her call.The doctor also may be waiting for the patient to be checked in,wasting valuable doctor time.In addition, many patients experience long waits onthe phone when they are trying to schedule an appointment, while the nurse ischecking in patients or responding to another patient’s request in the o±ce.Every year, the clinic requires its patients to complete a form with their personaland insurance information, rather than have them just verify what is currently on²le.This annoys some of the parents when they have to complete all of thispaperwork while taking care of their sick young child in the waiting room.At the beginning of each day, the nurses pull the ²les for all patients who haveappointments scheduled for that day.However, the clinic also accepts walk-inpatients. When a walk-in patient or emergency case arrives at the o±ce, thecorresponding patient ²le must be located and pulled.05/15/2017IFSM 305 – Case StudyPage | 2
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