There is a wisdom in his advice in terms of who returns and who doesn't. We did the same thing we all our patients going into AC. They and frequently the entire family if we had multiple members under the same roof, got entered if and when they scheduled for an appointment the first time post go live with AC date two years ago. This was much easier than holding off until we have everyone in there. First phonecall or appointment, in they went. This saved us from entering those folks who didn't return or were infrequent fliers. About 3/4's of a year in we knew it was time for a visit on that first refill call or what have you, I need more anti-hystamines, well you're not in our new database and we have be using it for about 9 months now, so I'm sure that Nancy is going to want to see you before any sort of a renewal...
And we entered families in a batch most of the time simply because you've got most of the demographics for all of them right there, same phone #'s, address, carrier, subscriber, and so on. It was much easier to just do all half dozen right there on the spot as you started to remember most of it half way thru... That's why I suggested a family radio button to add family members. To create a new patient that shares almost all those same basic data points except the name and date of birth. And we can always tweak anything else if it was really needed. But it sure would be a labor saver...
We do pull the paper less and less, but that is why I want something like FAP for the from this day on paper and faxes in pdf like form that has a good naming system as opposed to the less than perfect AC system of 00000001, 00000002 and so on and so forth. This way we always know who's labs were who's even if we are forced by the gov't to switch EMR's against our will one day.... Zig Heil! I can't wait to be done with my network tweaks, repairs and upgrades from last week and finally really start playing with FAP. I think it is going to be "just what the doctor ordered".....
