Thursday, January 16, 2014

USA Physicians Group Implementing EHR Software

The University of South Alabama Physicians Group is in the process of implementing Electronic Health Record (EHR) software throughout all its clinics. EHR is an alternative to paper charts, where doctors document encounters with patients.

Benefits of EHR software include immediate access to patient records in multiple locations and to multiple members of the care team simultaneously, as well as organization of data.

During the past three years, the EHR product NextGen has been implemented in the following clinics: Family Medicine, Pediatrics, Obstetrics & Gynecology, Stanton Road Clinic, Knollwood Physicians Group, and Mastin Medical Specialties. Implementation in the Neurology, Surgery, Orthopaedics, Neurosurgery, Gastroenterology and Cardiology clinics will continue in 2014.

According to Harvey Ikner, chief of practice operations for the USA Health Services Foundation, the driving force behind the commitment to move forward with the implementation was the Affordable Care Act, which imposed penalties for not implementing EHR and provided stimulus monies to help offset the initial cost of the implementation.

“As of today we have received a total of $2,809,250 in stimulus funding and anticipate approximately another $2,700,000 more to come as we submit attestations for our providers meeting meaningful use benchmarks associated with our EHR,” Ikner said.

“We have made great strides in implementing our EHR,” he added. “I would like to especially thank Dr. Lamar Duffy, EHR lead physician, and Debbie Mullins, director of EHR, as well as the entire EHR implementation team for their hard work, dedication and enthusiasm during this process.”

Other components of the USA Health System – including USA Children’s & Women’s Hospital, USA Medical Center and USA Mitchell Cancer Institute – implemented EHR software in May 2012.

To learn more about electronic health records, watch the video below or click here.


EHR implementation - Dr. Duffy from USA Health System on Vimeo.