Health Insurance Tips For When You Travel

Do you ever think about your health insurance when you are traveling? You should! You need the protection of medical insurance even more when you travel than when you are at home! Whether you are traveling within your own general region or from one country to another, it is important to have your health insurance identification with you. If you should have a problem involving your health while you are traveling, medical professionals will need access to your health records as well as your health insurance information. 

Many major health insurance companies have coverage that is accepted in most areas where you would be traveling. Whether you require a refill on your blood pressure medications while you are away from home or need to visit a doctor/s office for an allergy shot, the professionals helping you will need access to your health records as well as seeing your health insurance identification card.

Not only will it save the money you would have to spend for these medical needs, easy availability of this information will enable the doctor or pharmacist to help you quicker and more efficiently.

Since these medical professionals are not familiar with you personally, mistakes might be made that could cause serious complications for your health if they can’t verify your medical conditions. Being able to contact your health insurance company and your primary care physician swiftly could save your life.

In some areas, health cards are available encoded with all of the patient medical records. These cards are no larger than a credit card. If you carry a card like this when you travel, medical professionals will be able to care for your medical needs much easier. Your health insurance information can be included also.

There has been a lot of discussion about having this information encoded on a chip that could be imbedded into your skin. If you were in an accident, for instance, your information would be immediately available. 

Although this could be very helpful, it does cause concern regarding personal privacy rights of the individual. Another concern relates to the possible loss of personal freedom when a person allows this invasive procedure to be done for the sake of convenience.

Maybe it is better to just carry your health insurance provider’s identification card with you when you travel. 

If you have a chronic health issue such as diabetes, for example, you can carry information about your condition in your wallet. However, in the near future, the chip may be required for passports enabling you to travel to other countries. Keeping a card on you that lists vital medical information, including emergency contacts is a very good idea, though. Another option is to wear dog tags with your vital info on them. Dog tags can be worn around the neck, and are easily seen in case of an emergency.

Taking the extra time to take a few important documents with you when you travel can save tons of headaches and trouble later. It's not hard to make the necessary preparations, and as they say, a stitch in time saves nine!

By: Roberto Bell

Adoption Of Electronic Medical Report Systems: The Role Of Speech Recognition

With the introduction of The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) enacted by Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama on February 17, 2009, the push to digitize patient medical records has been at the forefront of Health Information Management. The act calls for the digitization of all medical records by the end of 2014, which means that all medical practices in the United States will be required to transition to Electronic Medical Records (EMR). Still, in today’s world, the most common types of health information exchanges are typically paper copies of paper medical records. To date, there has been very little automated data exchange between hospitals and physicians. 

So, you might ask, how will the government effect the digitization of American health records, and influence the way physicians and hospitals store and transmit health information? To answer this question, we must look to the stipulations of the HITECH Act.

The health component of the ARRA bill is the HITECH Act, which appropriates $19.5 billion dollars to encourage the adoption and effective utilization of Electronic Medical Records (alternately referred to as Electronic Health Records, or EHR). The two primary goals of the HITECH Act are to mobilize physicians who have been slow to adopt Electronic Medical Records to a computerized system, and to ensure that patient data is actively and securely exchanged between healthcare professionals. To do so, the government has allocated funds to catalyze the desired changes.

The HITECH Act stipulates $2 billion will be immediately provided to the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) and its sub-agency, the Office of the National Coordinator of Health IT. $320 million of this $2 billion will be used to establish more Health Information Exchange (HIE) initiatives, help existing HIEs to progress in connecting providers, and to ensure standards are consistent across products and care settings. 

The biggest winners under the HITECH Act are the clinicians. $36 billion will be paid over a five-year period to healthcare providers that demonstrate meaningful use of Electronic Medical Records. These payments are designed to reward hospitals and physicians for effectively using robust, connected EMR systems. Conversely, practices that do not implement effective EMR systems by 2015 will be penalized, and will be required to forfeit Medicare fees. The net cost to the Federal government is anticipated to be $19.5 billion after savings are achieved through efficiencies, tax revenue and Medicare fee reductions for non-adopters.

All said, there is quite a bit of government money to be distributed to qualifying physicians and hospitals. Physicians who adopt effective EMR systems will eligible to receive as much as $64,000 over five years according to the HITECH Act. In order to qualify for incentive payments, both physicians and hospitals have to demonstrate three things:

1. Use of a certified EMR with ePrescribing capability that meets current HHS standards.

2. Connectivity to other providers to improve speed and quality of access to patient medical information.

3. Ability to report on their use of the technology to the HHS.

Physicians may qualify for one of two incentive programs (not both). There is a Medicaid program and a Medicare program.

Under the Medicaid program, physicians who see more than 30% of patients paying with Medicaid (20% for pediatricians) are eligible for payments of up to $64,000 over five years. Under the Medicare program, physicians who accept Medicare payments (but do not have a large volume of Medicaid patients) are eligible to receive $44,000 over five years. The Medicare plan also stipulates physicians operating in a “health provider shortage area” will be eligible for an incremental increase of 10%, and those who deliver care entirely in a hospital environment (e.g. anesthesiologists) are ineligible.

Physicians who do not demonstrate meaningful use of an EMR by the end of 2014 will see their 2015 fee schedules decrease by 1%. Additional decreases will be implemented in 2016 and 2017 down to a total of 97% of the regular fee schedule for non-participating physicians. This can be reduced even further (down to 95%) if the total adoption is below 75% in 2018.

What exactly constitutes the definition of “meaningful use” of an Electronic Medical Record is still under debate. We do know that most physicians agree that “meaningful use” of an EMR should mean highly accessible and detailed health records. According to a study by Nuance Communications, Inc. – a leading supplier of speech solutions aimed at making the transition to EMRs easier for clinicians – physicians cited faster access, more complete patient reports, and better caregiver-to-caregiver communication as important to defining meaningful use of an EMR.

In addition to gaining insight that physicians value readily available, highly detailed Electronic Medical Records, the Nuance study also shed light on physicians’ concerns about existing obstacles that impede EMR adoption. Ninety percent of physicians said that they were concerned about usability as the leading obstacle impeding EMR adoption. Armed with this knowledge, Nuance has developed a speech recognition software solution that greatly increases usability and function within an EMR system.

Nuance Communications’ voice recognition software – Dragon Medical 10 – is the industry-leading speech recognition software. The software eliminates physicians’ need to rely on typing, clicking and scrolling, something that 67 percent of doctors surveyed cited as a usability concern. This gives physicians more time to allocate toward patient care instead of reporting. And, because most doctors speak three times faster than they type, Dragon Medical speech recognition software can improve productivity by up to 25%. 

Dragon Medical software empowers physicians with the technology they need to digitize their practice. Dragon allows physicians to dictate records into Microsoft Word and other common desktop applications, effectively increasing usability. Physicians can develop templates for repeat use, helping them easily dictate patient notes by voice. Dragon Medical makes it easy for physicians to take that first step toward adopting EMR systems.

Dragon Medical was developed by Nuance to accelerate physician adoption of EMR software by allowing clinicians to navigate an EMR system by voice. Dragon allows doctors to dictate medical decision-making – history of present illness, review of systems, assessment, and plan – directly into EMR systems – eliminating transcription and ensuring more complete clinical documentation. Dragon Medical fully supports HIPAA patient information confidentiality requirements.

Dragon Medical 10 speech recognition software is a must for every physician, as it greatly increases productivity by making EMR systems easier to adopt and use. Dragon is the first step for physicians looking to digitize their practice and save money on transcription costs, and is a valuable solution for physicians who want to take advantage of available government incentives for EMR adoption. 

Get rid of the paper files, and do away with the keyboard and mouse! Dragon Medical speech recognition technology is the future of Electronic Medical Record technology.

Learn more about how Dragon Medical 10 can ease the transition to an EMR system while improving the quality of care at your practice. Physicians wanting to see a demo of Dragon Medical are encouraged to visit http://www.genesis-technologies.com/cart/Dragon-Medical-c987/ or call 800-433-6326.

By: Genesis Technologies

How An Ehr Vendor Can Change Your Online Experience

Who would have thought that even a decade ago that important services like finding electronic health records or an EHR vendor would move to the web. These days, more and more medical services are finding their way online and for good reason. The Internet has become a dynamic avenue full of information and knowledge that everyone can use. This information can even include health-related services and products like electronic medical records that can easily be viewed online.

When the web first took on wide adoption, the Internet was basically a web of static informational pages. Business websites typically only offered contact information, product lists, menus or other general information. In the past decade, the web started to gain momentum with a completely different type of website, which we now refer to as a dynamic website, or database driven website. One of the best ideas is being able to offer medical records on one of these dynamically driven sites.

This type of website makes services such as an EHR vendor possible. Instead of static content that is embedded, or hard coded into a website, dynamic sites can serve up content that is pulled from a database. This change provided entirely new possibilities and transformed how we now see and use the Internet. When it comes to medical applications, database driven sites can include electronic health records that compare various vendors, products and services. Having a vendor for electronic health records make the process of finding what you need a lot faster.

The best sites will allow you to compare the many vendors out there so that you have all the necessary information you need in one place on the web. This means you no longer have to continuously search on the multitude of pages that may come up in search results. Providing a one-stop shop to compare systems makes the process not only easier, but also faster, more efficient and very cost effective. 

Have you ever heard of software-as-a-service? This type of service is software that is provided to you online. So what does that have to do with services like electronic health records? The evolution of the web from static websites to dynamic websites has provided a reliable way for services to be provided to users via the web. A web-based EHR vendor saves end users from having to install and manage complex software and also takes the headache away from worrying about software updates or even data security.

A reputable provider will house their data center within a secure building and have redundancies at all points of potential failure. If you’re looking at web-based health record services, it might be the right time to check it out, thanks to the new web. You can easily get up-to-date information such as doctors’ schedules, online charting systems and even e-prescribing. In this way, doctors can submit prescriptions to pharmacies over the web, which makes the process of selecting and using a great EHR vendor a lot easier not only for the doctors but also for the patients.

By: Sandy Winslow

What Are The Benefits Of Personal Electronic Health Records?

An electronic application that allows patients to access and manage their health information with privacy, confidentiality and security is known as a personal electronic health record. The information gathered in this particular application is organized therefore making it easy for patients to make decisions in the process of health care. 

There are a lot of electronic systems in the market today that offer special features that will allow patients to make appointments, set reminders for their upcoming appointments, read summaries of the consultation and messaging platform between doctor and patient. Any unnecessary appointments are avoided and any limitations regarding to geographical boundaries between doctor and patient are also overcome.

What exactly are the benefits of this particular system? One major benefits of such system is achieving control over their health records and easy manageability of the information where they can share it with other people especially with their loved one. There is also such thing as the provider’s electronic records, which is generally under the control and supervision of the patient’s health care provider.

In personal electronic health records, the information collected and encoded is relatively comprehensive. This has the specific summaries basing on data taken from various sources. Relevant information such as family history, medical history and medication history are also indicated in the system. Maintenance of the system will enable patients to review their health issues and provide hard evidence for any other issues that may arise.

Personal electronic health records, aside from tracking your health history, can also provide various other benefits such as relevant information pertaining to whatever situation you are in during the consult. This will act as your viable source of medical information and is useful during insurance claims or reimbursement claims.

Attached scanned health-related documents can also provide future benefits as well and all of these are being collected and tracked within personal electronic health records in order to empower patients to take control of their health and eventually their lives. Keeping all these scanned documents may save you from repeating one procedure after another because of the document present at hand and this will save you money as well.

By: James Guertin