Home Forums Lots of updox questions

I'm loving updox now that I've figured it out and my patients are learning to love it too. I'm using it for fax, patient portal, and online scheduling (which is the coolest feature ever...has cut down on phone calls and once they figure it out, patients love it). I want to start using the forms option in the patient portal but can't figure out how. I'm finding that once I am told how to do something, it is obvious...but I'm just not finding it. And it's Saturday so no help from updox until next week.

Also, how do you use forms to improve the workflow in your practice? Meg at updox mentioned using forms for prescription refill requests but I'm imagining there are endless opportunities.

Also, when you have processed a document, do you archive it or delete it?

Oh, and is there a way to scan something directly into updox or do you scan it to a folder on your computer and then "print" to updox?

Do you save the "READ" messages to EMR? (The ones that notify you that whatever you sent to the portal has been read.)

Are there any hidden features of updox you discovered and wished you knew before?

By the way, Meg told me that the capability for new patients to schedule online (like ZocDoc) is in the works. Woohoo!

Robin,
I have been using Updox for over a year, but do not use the online scheduling because our office uses Lytec 11 for the PM/scheduler.
I use both templates and forms. The templates are designed to send from Dr. to the patient. The forms designed to send from patient to Dr.
The templates can be used for educational purposes, and individualized, so the health maintenance items, such as diet, exercise, diabetic diet/CHO counting etc. the templates are attached to the patient summary and my nurse will attach specific templates which I indicate in the summary end of note. I educate at the visit and then this is so noted in the summary and then the patient will have the educational material attached to the summary for future reference. Most like, very few complaints with this.
The forms can be filled out by the patient at home on their computer, and consist of appointment requests, Rx requests, demographic data, and the 2 page Medicare required annual visit survey.
Some patients use the forms, probably 2/3 do not and just secure message with Rx requests or appointment requests. But either way the portal has been extremely helpful in cutting down phone tag and voice mails, and most patients have come to really appreciate getting a hold of me in this fashion.
I archive all stuff, which is kept at Updox for at least 6 months on their server.
We do very little scanning now that the hospital, outside physicians and pharmacies have my Updox fax number, but when we do scan, it is usually directly into AC or you could to Updox, either way.
Yes, I will save the read messages to AC.
One feature is the point of entry that patients will read whenever they sign onto the portal. It is there that I will put information such as vacation time, basic formalities/expectations of how to use the portal, not to use the portal for emergencies etc....

Jimmie,

I am trying to sell the idea of Updox to the Dr. He is a very hard sale. I have slowly looked into Updox and just the other day he came to me to look into a program to speed up the importing of faxes into patient charts. We have a Brother MFC that we use as our fax sever and import digital faxes that way. There are a number of clicks using that method and also very limited editing. He had in mind something that would automatically import the fax into the patient chart. I've not heard of such a thing. Is that even possible? Have you heard of anything that would do that?

IMHO Updox would be great for our office. The ease of importing faxes, the ability to edit faxes without having to print them out and the patient portal. I'm just having to convince him that the $500/year us worth it.

This is similar to what the lab interfaces accomplish. It would be nice, maybe add to the list of suggestions for future AC upgrades.

I have looked (before using Updox 2 years ago), and I found nothing to automatically import faxes. Beside that, doesn't filing a report require a physician annotation that he reviewed the report, and a method to let staff and/or the patient know how to deal with the result? So some physician "clicking" is required. As said above, with Updox, you import faxes from the Brother MFC into a folder that automatically sends them into Updox (at no per fax cost). The doc reviews the fax, then "signs off" while simultaneously filing into the patient's chart and sending a message to staff/creating a patient portal message -- all with a single click.

Charlene,

I will get back to you later--will tie a few loose ends up at office.

I wish you could watch how simple it is. I look at the fax on updox...say, lab results. I click on all the places I want to send it (for example, I just did one for which I clicked "send to EHR, send to portal, send to contact." On the one going to portal, I typed a message for the patient explaining the results and what I wanted done. On the one going to the EHR, I clicked "sign off" because I'm done with it. The one going to the contact, I started typing the name of another provider to whom I wanted to fax the results and, since she is already entered as a contact, the rest of her name appeared and I clicked on it. I have it set up so that if the patient doesn't read their results in the portal in 4 days, it notifies me (it can be set to notify me or a staff member or whatever). I click send and the whole thing disappears...filed in AC, faxed to the other provider, sent to the portal for the patient. Easiest system I've ever used.

It took an adjustment to realize it was faster for me to work in updox myself rather than have someone else (my husband) send everything to me in AC but I found it took much less effort for me to just send it where it needs to go.

Let me know if there's more information that would help.

Could Updox buy PriMed?

Charlene,

I am not aware of anything that one can use to automatically import the fax into the chart.

I have only used the old paper fax machine before starting Updox in early 2012.

I phased the patient portal in about a month or so after starting with Updox.

Maybe the best way is to have him try the 15 day free trial. However with that being said, I paid upfront for the monthly fee to get the 888 number to start using right away. It took about 2-3 weeks after giving all local docs, hospital, and labs my new 888 number before I started to realize what a time saver it is when all the faxes started coming in to the Updox work area.
Like John says the most costly portion is the fax bundles, so there is a way to integrate that with the Brother MFC. However, I do not have any experience with this and someone with support at Updox could help integrate.
I have not started Snappyfax as recommended by Charlie at Updox in the past, to save on faxing cost, but that is another alternative for those who have high volume faxing.

My practice is really quite simple and my nurse and I manage the Updox workspace like a dance. She will handle the incoming faxes, decide where they go in the chart send to AC, or take the signed prescription or home health certification and direct it to the necessary agency. Our physical set up is such that she can "yell" at me to sign this or that or make sure which pharmacy it goes to. But working in tandem helps us both and our electronic workspace on Updox is shared and is essentially the same as we hit the refresh button after each job is taken care of.

I think quite honestly if my nurse had to choose between AC and Updox she would favor the latter.

I have one other user, and this is one of our billers out front, who will need patient records or demographics from time to time and the HIPAA compliant internal messaging utilized does not count towards the fax. But it is a nice system those two utilize--in fact my nurse sent 3 or 4 records today out to the biller (who is physically removed) for the medicare reviewer who will be coming by tomorrow. Keeps the medicare reviewer away from any computer or data, other than what she needs.

I do not know if this helps, but Updox is not for everyone, but there is no way in *&^ I would go back to paper now that I have finally transitioned into the 21st century.

As much as I wanted Updox to work for me I found it took me too much time to review all the faxes then do what I had to with them, perhaps if it wasn't just myself in the back and my wife in the front and we had another person to do some of the work it would have been better workflow but I was spending 60-90 mins a day dealing with faxes.
If anyone can give me suggestions on compacting the flow so it saves time I would gladly rethink using it.
I don't care about MU stuff just geeting labs,xray,consults into AC and answering faxes from NH and pharmacies.

Just wanted to throw this out real quick, automatically importing faxes into the EHR is something we've definitely been asked to do and have thought about, but it's not something that we're likely to do any time soon. The problem is that there is no reliable way to figure out the patient (never mind pick a sensible title and category).

The fax is simple an image, we would have to use OCR (optical character recognition) to try and "read" the fax, and then programmatically attempt to decide where on the entire page the patient name was. Those of you who have any experience with OCR know that while it is quite an impressive technology, it's nowhere close to providing the 100% confidence that we would need to make decisions on where to file documents. We feel that we cannot risk the chance of a mis-filed document, I'm sure you can imagine the significance of missing an urgent lab because it's not in the right patient's chart.

It is sad, but I did a time study and I either look at faxes, sign them, give them to my nurse, and then she files....or I do it all on updox.....now I have a another problem. I took 3000 or so pages off of her desk and now she talks to her mother while I am clicking and e-filing...I like updox and wont go back...I am still on the beginning edge of the learning cureve, but I like it...I was hoping that one of them would be coming NORTH NEAR FINDLAY - so I could buy them lunch and they could give me an inservice...HINT HINT...todd

This sounds like less of an Updox issue and more of a "huge number of faxes" issue. There are 3 basic ways to handle it. 1) Paper fax machine, scan the fax into AC, 2) Electronic Fax/Internet fax, save fax to pdf file and import into AC, or 3) Updox Fax (a particular internet fax with integration to AC) and sign off in UPdox then send to AC or just have someone send the fax to AC from Updox and sign it from within AC.

For us, UpDox is the real upside of going electronic. The problem is it were to import automatically would be that the provider might miss seeing something. Also there are 4 of us in the office, and the front office person has to send the fax to the right person for review. We do this by assigning a different color tab to each provider, and then filtering for that color.

We are getting our feet wet with the scheduler. It seems to work fine, but we are a bit nervous about implementing fully as patients often don't know what kind of appointment they need... they think it is a brief appointment for a prescription refill, for example, whereas we write prescriptions for one year and if a refill is needed an annual exam is due. So we have a limited number of online slots available for acute problems. The appointment reminder works well, and patients do appreciate this. Also, the online payment option is used regularly, and has helped cash flow quite a bit.

We started with the portal from day one. The information flow we have developed is very clean. Patients love it.

Todd, what you have said is totally true... It echoes my observation that going electronic has NOT saved any time or made me more efficient, as I am now personally having to do a bunch more clerical tasks than with paper. Example: used to go to inbox, pick up lab slip, initial, put in outbox. Now it is import, review, send to portal with note, add note to lab, sign off. However, I have to (grudgingly) admit that I am missing fewer things than I used to by being forced to attend to each thing personally.

Jimmie and all...

Thank you for all your input. It's very much appreciated and very helpful. I believe I'm on the road to getting an OK for Updox The contact at Updox has answered a lot and your information adds even more pros.

Just a little side note...

I love this board. I'm fairly new to posting on here and don't say much, but this place has been very informative and helpful.

Charlene,

Wish you well on your endeavor. Thanks.
P.S. Is that a K-cup machine I see?

Actually that would be a BUNN. 10 cups of coffee in 3 mins!

Charlene,
I am glad that you have prevailed with your "sale". Indy did an analysis some time ago, and while there are many variables, a conservative set of assumptions led to the figure of 14 cents saved per incoming fax with Updox (that is in staff time, as compared to them handling the faxes manually). Be sure you tell your boss to subtract that from the Updox bill each month, when he is calculating the cost of the program.
As Tobin describes, the idea of a fax that is "automatically" imported is still a fantasy; someone needs to assign it to a patient, put it in the right folder, and give it a name. These things are technically possible but the degree of accuracy we require is simply not there yet.
Another useful technique for the boss is to have him sit at the desk and import 20 faxes without Updox, then 20 with it. The value of Updox suddenly becomes much easier to grasp.

Koby and Todd... there are many ways to vary the workflow with Updox, and some of the ones that lead to the biggest savings in staff time do so at the expense of the provider's time. It is worth looking at various ways to handle the incoming faxes to try to minimize this. I don't have a one-size-fits-all answer, but try to let the staff handle things first (just as they would if paper faxes came out of the machine) and only forward to you the ones you really need to see.

We send everything into AC via Updox. Something we do is that for the items that only need to be filed into AC, we edit inside Updox with a signature stamp which the MA can see in Updox that the item has been reviewed and needs to be sent to AC.

The items that have not been signed, the provider needs to review.
The items that have been signed, the MA sends to AC
The items that need further attention than that, the provider sends to AC.