Home Forums Discussions General Discussion ? best strategy to organize and bring data into AC

I am planning to launch AC this Fall for my peds practice. I am looking at all of the paper data coming in by mail and fax, all the practice administratively generated data from within, and all of those old records, and I am wondering what many of you have found to be your best solutions for organizing this data and absorbing what is necessary into AC. I have software for paperport 9 and paperport 11. I have heard of updocs and FAP.
I have lots of ideas but lack the practical experience; and I thank you in advance for your help.

1. Get a good sheet-fed scanner. I use the Fujitsu ScanSnap -- it is very dependable and fast. Any paper documents that come in get scanned, then either imported into AC (if you need to refer to them frequently) or archived into a patient-specific reference file on your networked file server (for rarely needed data).
2, If you use Updox, you don't need a fax machine or a fax telephone line to receive or send faxes, and you have a patient portal if you want to make reports available to patients.
3. Use AC for all encounter notes, orders, eRx.

That's it, you are completely paperless.

Hi, Richard

There will be be as many answers as there are users on this forum, but I'll give mine.
A few months ago, shortly after going electronic, I made a post http://www.amazingcharts.com/ub/ubb...ue/Re_Before_you_buy_a_scanner#Post22871 in which I offered the opinion that a reasonable approach is to NOT scan in old records, just bring in new stuff (we are using UpDox) and leave the paper charts on the shelf until they die of old age. Many users disagree with this, but I am sticking by it. Converting from paper to electronic was overwhelming enough for us that scanning in a lot of stuff that is really of very limited use would have been the final straw. We DO pull the paper charts of everyone coming in to be seen for the first time since going electronic a few days ahead of time and then enter a problem list, vaccine history, PMH, FH and SH, then mark the chart as "do not pull". This may be easier for an IM practice with fewer daily visits than I envision you must have. We use UpDox instead of a scanner for the few things we do need.

There are so many good options for this and so many ways that I'm unsure where to guide you. Leslie's method is a popular one although Bert will guide you away from the Brother MFP. I tend to agree with Bert but it is a cheap MFP and pretty reliable.

I don't do all of the .pdf conversion and importing that Leslie does. I have my staff do all of that and it works well. I just sign off on all of it through AC.

Leslie's Method

For me, it was hit and miss. I worked through a lot of the bumps and figured out what worked best in my office.

Thank you all. I am looking at all of your suggestions.

I am not sure how to sign off imported items.
I imported a test pdf file into a test patient's chart. I right clicked the file imported and clicked to 'sign-off item'. and received a message that the item was already signed off.???

For patient data that needs to be saved but not directly into the imported AC, do you have suggestions how to organize your folder - file structure?

Is there a way to manage "practice documents" like put the documents in alphabetical order

If you are logged in as the physician, and open the patient's chart to the "Imported Items" tab, merely drag the document into the column on the left, and it is imported and signed off at the same time. You can then right click on the file and choose from a number of options, such as "Edit" (to rename it or file into a subfolder in Imported Items), "Delete", etc. When you right click, note that the item you dragged in already has the "Sign Off" box checked (at the bottom of the drop-down list).

If one of your logged in staff does the same import method above, a window opens, asking them to assign the item to a physician for sign off. When your name is chosen, the item is imported but its name remains red in the file list of the Imported Items tab of that patient. A message appears in your mailbox that the item is imported and ready to sign off. Double click on this message to open the sign off window, with an image of the item, and a button to sign it off.


I have a folder for each patient on a shared hard drive of the networked computer that I am using for archiving old patient documents. My format is Lastname+Firstname+6digitDOB (ie: SmithJohn122595), which gives a unique folder name and is searchable. Within this folder we put PDFs of old chart scans, TIFFs of faxes, JPEGs of insurance cards, etc.

You can make a shortcut on the desktop of each of your networked computers that opens this archive with a click, and anyone on the network can open and view these documents.