Primary Care Physician Improves Quality of Patient Care and Meets Government Compliance With Patagonia Health EHR
BACKGROUND
L. Faith Birmingham, MD, a board certified physician and practicing family doctor for more than 22 years, started her own solo family practice in 2003. The practice emphasizes positive patient relationships and quality of care above all.
Dr. Birmingham knew that with the new government mandate, she needed to move to an EHR, and soon. However, she wasn’t looking forward to the process, especially since she did not have a lot of spare time to learn a new EHR system. In addition, Dr. Birmingham needed an EHR solution that shared her vision of the real intent of a medical record–a tool for physicians to use in the care of patients over time in order to improve health outcomes. She looked at other larger EHR solutions, but they were too expensive, time-consuming and cumbersome. The other solutions were also stuck in a model of predefined “check boxes and templates,” which populated notes with pre-selected text and did not allow her to tell the patient s story. That’s when she found Patagonia Health EHR.
SOLUTION
Patagonia Health is a web-based EHR solution that focuses on the needs of small primary care physician practices. Since 2009, Patagonia Health has worked with Dr. Birmingham to make the transition to EHR. Patagonia Health s voice recognition, learning system, record sharing, personalization capabilities and document management components support Dr. Birmingham s vision of how an EHR system should function. The web-based solution is flexible and adapts to her workflow, which allows her to focus on building positive patient relationships. Patagonia’s approach to EHR and the way they cater to small primary care physicians was very refreshing and like nothing I’ve ever seen before, said Dr. Birmingham. The user-friendly system worked with me–I didn’t have to bend into Patagonia’s vision of how an EHR system should work. It adapted to me on all fronts.
PROCESS
Since making the switch to Patagonia Health EHR, Dr. Birmingham has been able to uphold and improve her practice’s quality of patient care while meeting government compliance. Patagonia’s intuitive, easy-to-use solution saves time and increases efficiencies, which means no IT headache or extended learning period for physician or staff. The system’s record-sharing capabilities allow Dr. Birmingham to quickly locate critical patient information, thereby reducing liabilities. In the future, Dr. Birmingham envisions using the EHR solution’s reporting capabilities to track standards of care across the practice in order to gain a holistic overall view of her patients. She is also looking forward to using the Dragon® voice (voice recognition) feature to capture patient interaction without having to type. “Patagonia Health EHR really fits into my vision of the true value an EHR system should provide. I’m able to use their technology to enhance my relationships with my patients, not be a substitute for those relationships.
“Patagonia Health EHR really fits into my vision of the true value an EHR system should provide. I’m able to use their technology to enhance my relationships with my patients, not be a substitute for those relationships.”
BENEFITS
- Easy, intuitive user experience
- EHR solution catered toward small practice
- System that adapts to you and your workflow
- Gain holistic view of patients individually and across practice
- Improved quality of patient care
- Capture the patient’s story without prede ned templates
L. Faith Birmingham
Managing Director
