{Straight talk for clients.}

IN THIS ISSUE: Confused and stressed about the OSHA deadline to electronically submit your organization’s 2016 300A form by December 15^th, 2017? Read the Flash for clarity about the current state of the rule and to learn how Agility can help ease your mind.

Dear Agility,

I’ve heard a lot this year about the proposed OSHA requirement to electronically submit our 2016 300A form. We have some confusion and concern about this. What is the final rule, and is there anything in Agility to help us report?

The Scenario

First, some backstory: The original OSHA rule required the submission of the 2016 Form 300A by July 1^st, 2017. In June 2017, OSHA published a notice of proposed rulemaking to extend the date by which employers are required to submit their data to December 1^st, 2017. On November 24^th, a final rule was published that sets a deadline of December 15^th, 2017 as the submission date for the 2016 Form 300A to the Injury Tracking Application (ITA).  Reference the ITA to determine if this rule applies based on your employee count, industry, and state.

The Injury Tracking Application Launch Page lists three ways to submit data:

1. Manual data entry of the 300A information for each establishment
2. Upload a .csv* file to the Injury Tracking Application
3. Submit data through a third-party application via an API**

*Comma-separated values (.csv) – A format that allows for exporting and importing of data stored in tables, similar to an Excel spreadsheet.

**Application Program Interface (API) – specifies how software components should interact.

The Solution

The November 6^th release of Agility 10.17 included a new utility to help streamline the submission process. Within one screen you can review your 300A data with OSHA recordable totals calculated based on information entered in Agility (per establishment, where applicable), enter external data (like annual average number of employees or total hours worked by all employees) and generate the .csv file for manual upload on OSHA’s Injury Tracking Application.

Additional instructions regarding the .csv export as well as information on how to schedule your upgrade can be found here and are posted to Net Health University within the OSHA folder found under Documentation.

In 2018, OSHA requires qualifying establishments to electronically submit all 2017 OSHA forms by July 1, 2018, and we’ll plan to continue equipping you with tools in Agility to make this as simple as possible. As always, the OSHA website will provide you with the most up to date information as we move into 2018.

For more details about the rule and questions around reporting across multiple locations, click here to view OSHA’s Frequently Asked Questions.

If you have further questions about how Agility functionality will support reporting, contact Customer Support at agilitysupport@nethealth.com or 888-464-9348 option 3.

This month’s contributor was Sheila Cougras, Director of Compliance.

Did you know? 

Agility now offers an after-care summary that, among other things, can remind patients/employees where you sent their electronic prescriptions. The summary is patient-focused and can also be a great write-up to provide employees with reminders about things like necessary follow-up and restrictions.

If you’re using the EMR charting functionality, check out “New Patient Discharge Instruction Sheet” in the 10.14 release notes on NHU to learn more.

And the winner is….

Thanks for your feedback in our third quarter Product Satisfaction Survey.

Each quarter, we ask you to complete a brief survey sharing Agility feedback. Those who complete the survey can enter a drawing for either a donation to a charity of the winner’s choice or a prize, most recently an Apple Watch.  Our third quarter winner was Betsy P. Congratulations! Thanks for your thoughtful feedback.

This November, our survey will be coming from a third-party vendor with a few more questions than usual. We would greatly appreciate your time in giving additional feedback, and you’ll see our short and sweet Product Satisfaction Survey return in 2018.

There’s always more to learn.

What’s Net Health University? Your place to access to the most up-to-date Agility Software release notes, videos (including webinars of our Manager, Employee, Employer, and Patient portals), and other materials. No college entrance exams or essays required. If you’re not already registered, click here.