A real challenge for the modern rounding physician is the disconnect between inpatient care and outpatient practice. Managing patient information, coordinating care transitions, and ensuring accurate billing across these settings can be a significant administrative burden. This is where a solution like HybridChart becomes invaluable, bridging this gap with seamless connectivity that streamlines workflows, enhances communication, and ultimately boosts revenue. This article will focus on the critical aspect of connectivity and how HybridChart empowers rounding specialists to stay connected to their home practice, even while managing inpatient responsibilities.

The Connectivity Conundrum: Inpatient vs. Outpatient

For specialists who round, the challenge lies in maintaining a cohesive workflow between the hospital and their home practice. Traditionally, this involves cumbersome processes:

• Manual Charting and Data Entry: Transferring patient information between paper charts, hospital EHRs, and the home office EHR is time-consuming and prone to errors.
• Delayed Communication: Coordinating care transitions and scheduling follow-up appointments often involves phone calls, faxes, and other inefficient methods, leading to delays and potential miscommunication.
• Billing Discrepancies: Ensuring accurate and timely billing for both inpatient and outpatient services can be complex, especially when data is scattered across different systems.

HybridChart: A Connected Ecosystem for Seamless Care

HybridChart addresses these challenges by creating a connected ecosystem that seamlessly links the inpatient and outpatient settings. This connectivity is built on several key features:

1. Mobile App for Rounding Physicians:

The HybridChart mobile app empowers rounding physicians with real-time access to crucial information at the point of care:

• Census Management via ADT Feeds: HybridChart integrates with hospital ADT (Admission, Discharge, Transfer) feeds, providing a live, up-to-the-minute view of the patient census. Incoming and outgoing patients appear and are cleared in real-time, eliminating the need for manual updates and ensuring accurate patient tracking. This means the physician’s rounding list is always current, reflecting the most recent patient activity.
• Real-Time Charge Capture: Physicians can capture charges directly at the bedside using their mobile devices. This eliminates the need for paper charge slips and reduces the risk of lost or inaccurate billing information. These charges sync instantly with the home office and any connected billing company or EHR.
• Secure, HIPAA-Compliant Messaging: The app facilitates real-time, HIPAA-compliant communication between the rounding physician and the home office staff. This eliminates the need for insecure communication methods like texting or personal email, ensuring patient privacy and data security. Messages are collated at the patient level, creating a clear audit trail of all communication related to a specific patient.

2. Desktop Interface for Home Office Staff:

The HybridChart desktop interface provides the home office staff with a powerful set of tools to manage patient information and coordinate care:

• Real-Time Census Visibility: The front office staff has the same real-time view of the patient census as the rounding physician. This allows them to proactively manage patient flow, schedule follow-up appointments, and address any urgent needs.
• Charge Reconciliation and Billing Integration: Charges captured by the rounding physician sync instantly with the desktop interface and can be seamlessly integrated with the practice’s billing software and EHR. This streamlines the billing process, reduces errors, and ensures timely reimbursement.
• Discharge Planning Management: The desktop interface provides visibility into the physician’s discharge plans. This allows the front office staff to proactively reach out to discharged patients, schedule follow-up appointments, and ensure a smooth transition back to outpatient care.

3. Seamless Data Synchronization and Integration:

The true power of HybridChart lies in its seamless data synchronization and integration:

• Real-Time Data Flow: Data flows seamlessly between the mobile app, the desktop interface, the hospital ADT feed, the practice’s EHR, and the billing company. This eliminates data silos and ensures that everyone is working with the most up-to-date information.
• Bi-Directional Integration (Where Applicable): Depending on the EHR integration capabilities, data can flow in both directions, ensuring consistency across all platforms. This can include demographics, diagnoses, procedures, and other relevant patient information.
• API-Driven Connectivity: HybridChart leverages secure APIs to establish connections with various systems, ensuring a stable and reliable data exchange.

Key Value Propositions Driven by Connectivity:

• Increased Revenue: Real-time charge capture and seamless billing integration minimize lost charges and accelerate the revenue cycle. By capturing all billable services at the point of care and ensuring accurate data transfer, HybridChart helps practices maximize revenue.
• Enhanced Workflow Efficiency: Streamlined communication, automated data synchronization, and real-time census management eliminate manual tasks and improve overall workflow efficiency. This frees up valuable time for both the rounding physician and the home office staff, allowing them to focus on patient care and other important activities.
• Improved Patient Care Coordination: Seamless communication and visibility into discharge plans facilitate smoother transitions of care and improve patient follow-up. This coordinated approach enhances patient satisfaction and reduces the risk of complications.
• Reduced Administrative Burden: Automating data entry, charge capture, and communication reduces the administrative burden on both the rounding physician and the home office staff.

Connecting the Dots: An Example

Imagine a scenario where a patient is admitted to the hospital. The ADT feed instantly updates the patient census in HybridChart. The rounding physician sees the new admission on their HybridChart mobile app and rounds on the patient, capturing charges at the bedside. These charges instantly sync with the home office. The front office staff sees the charges and can begin the billing process. When the physician discharges the patient, this is also noted within the HybridChart desktop app, prompting the front office staff to schedule a follow-up appointment. All communication related to this patient is securely stored within HybridChart, creating a clear audit trail.

HybridChart empowers rounding specialists to bridge the gap between inpatient and outpatient care with seamless connectivity. By connecting the mobile app, the desktop interface, hospital ADT feeds, EHRs, and billing systems, HybridChart creates a connected ecosystem that streamlines workflows, enhances communication, and ultimately improves patient care and practice efficiency. This connected approach not only increases revenue and reduces administrative burden but also strengthens the connection between the rounding physician and their home practice, ensuring a cohesive and efficient approach to patient care.