A Regional Healthcare System in West Virginia Reunites Caregivers with Their Calling with Switch to Net Health ReDoc

written by blake I | December 17, 2020

We love the efficiency for our therapists to document at the point-of-care—the ability to have template workflows based on shoulder, hip, knee – whatever they want to create. Our therapists are able to leave earlier and not have paperwork left over for the nights and weekends, like they did when we were on paper.”

Director of Rehab, a West Virginia Regional Healthcare System

The Challenge

When a regional healthcare system in West Virginia decided to implement a new electronic health record (EHR) system, the outpatient rehab clinics – focused on occupational therapy (OT), physical therapy (PT), and speech-language pathology (SLP) – saw an opportunity to help therapists work more efficiently.

The Director of Rehab at the regional healthcare system recounted how staff had to work overtime frequently to complete necessary documentation from the day’s or week’s work. “You could drive by our clinic any time and there would be somebody’s car here,” she said. Further emphasizing her point, a System Director of Rehabilitation Services said, “Our goal is for our therapists to have work-life balance, and when they walk out of here, they’re done.”

When they realized that the system-wide EHR platform would not meet all their needs, they started looking for tools that would. Many alternatives did not support the clinics’ specialized services, and others were costly or would take a year to customize and implement. They sought a middle ground: a solution that supported OT, PT, and SLP, out of the box, quickly and cost-effectively.

Our goal is for [our therapists] to have work-life balance, and when they walk out of here, they’re done.”

Director of Rehab, a West Virginia Regional Healthcare System

The Solution

The regional health system’s journey with Net Health started in 2015, when its team implemented ReDoc® classic. They preferred ReDoc® classic’s ability to support specialty services with therapy templates out of the box, its integration with core hospital platforms, including billing, and its consolidation of tools and workflows.

More recently, the regional healthcare system migrated from ReDoc® classic to Net Health® ReDoc (formerly ReDoc® powered by xfit®). They recognized a few key benefits from this switch:

  • Improved efficiency of IT staff and processes thanks to cloud-based deployment – no more scheduling manual upgrades with IT
  • Streamlined user interfaces and workflows, minimizing the “swivel chair effect” of navigating between multiple screens and applications
  • Enhanced integrations with core interfaces (such as ADT), system-wide EHR, billing, e-Faxing, and FOTO
  • On-site support from Net Health during the migration

The facility also implemented an outcomes management system, Focus On Therapeutic Outcomes (FOTO), powered by Net Health. The system captures benchmarked, risk-adjusted comparisons to improve patient care and facilitate clinician growth while integrating with Net Health Therapy.

The Results

Thanks to Net Health Therapy’s robust reporting and the ease of onboarding new employees, rehab directors are now able to clearly demonstrate the need to grow their therapy staff to match patient growth. This also allows therapists to focus on delivering high-quality care to the regional healthcare system’s patients, while rehab directors can easily monitor productivity and ensure compliance. Finally, the healthcare system now has a superior ability to respond to audits quickly and effectively, minimizing claim errors and denials.

>50% reduction

in monthly compliance and proactive audit preparedness time

80% reduction

in management end-of-month reporting time

>98% patient satisfaction

as tracked in FOTO

Nearly 300% growth

in therapy staff at main site

Top 10% in patient outcome

in numerous categories as tracked in FOTO