Outdated Practices that Healthcare Workplaces Should Stop

The healthcare industry is quickly expanding and healthcare organizations must adapt to keep up with changing times. With a growing population and lifestyle changes, technological advancements in medicine, and the increasing demand for high-quality healthcare services are some of the catalysts propelling this growth. However, despite such significant progress, this industry encounters a myriad of operational challenges largely due to its traditional systems and outdated practices.

Moving Forward: Tackling Outdated Practices in Healthcare Head-On

Inefficient manual processes, siloed data systems, and stringent regulatory requirements are key factors that may hinder the efficiency of clinicians and ultimately the delivery of continual quality patient care. To rise above these challenges and ensure smooth and efficient workflows for clinicians as well as executives, healthcare organizations may want to consider deploying robust and technologically advanced healthcare time tracking software and hospital contract management solutions. Before doing so, one must gain an in-depth understanding of the aspects and outdated practices within the organization and the benefits of implementing the right software solution.

Efficiently Tracking Progress

On a daily basis, manually keeping track of patient interactions, physician time and schedules, staff and operations, billing and payments, and overall progress can prove to be an arduous task within the healthcare ecosystem. Manually keeping track of all these processes can lead to inconsistencies and errors, resulting in potential discrepancies in provider billing as well as compliance.

Moreover, keeping track of version histories of clinician contracts and any other important related documents is a top priority in any healthcare organization for legal and compliance purposes. Tracking all of the contract changes and revisions, and making certain all clinicians and stakeholders are operating based on the latest version of the contracts can be quite challenging without a systematic approach and solution in place. Standardizing documents and making use of contract management policy templates and physician timekeeping policies and procedures can streamline and simplify your processes.

Data Silos

Most healthcare organizations operate using disparate or manual systems, and as such, data silos are created where information is stored in individual departments or systems. This prevents key stakeholders from attaining a holistic view of all operations. When there is a break in information generation and display, it can lead to frustration with clinicians, fragmented patient care, duplicated physician efforts, and challenges in accessing correct and comprehensive patient data for better decision-making.

Approval Workflows

Manual approval processes for timesheets, invoices, and physician contracts can be error-prone and delayed. Routing documents for approvals and signatures manually can often result in lost paperwork, unplanned waiting periods, and a lack of accountability. The time and resources spent in this domain can be saved by implementing physician time tracking and contract management software.

The Need for Compliance and Access Privileges

It is imperative that healthcare organizations strictly adhere to regulatory requirements. This includes HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) designed to cater to the security and privacy of medical information, industry-specific guidelines, labor laws, and HITECH (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act) that promotes the adoption of EHR (Electronic Health Records) and its provisions for implementing HIPAA privacy and security mandates. Attempting to manually comply with regulations can prove to be labor-intensive while also significantly increasing the risk of non-compliance. 

Another key aspect is the management of patient and physician information. The previously adopted manual methods of allocating and tracking access permissions are susceptible to errors, which can lead to unauthorized access and even data breaches, resulting in monetary loss. You may like to read our blog on the risks of outdated physician timesheet management.

Healthcare organizations need to leverage cutting-edge physician time tracking and contract management software solutions to overcome outdated practices, cumbersome challenges and ensure smooth workflow and operations. All in all, automated monitoring of patient interactions, physician work and hours, and other key metrics helps streamline and track the processes and progress made. Additionally, data sources are amalgamated and uploaded on a centralized platform, making data access, patient care, and communication easier. 

Digital signatures, automated workflow routing, and accurate history tracking extended by such solutions enable stakeholders to ensure compliance and work on the latest documents and increase accountability, which is crucial for administrative as well as legal and regulatory requirements. Lastly, a robust software solution should be well-equipped with access permissions that grant sensitive data access to authorized personnel only, in line with data security and compliance requirements.

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