Tag Archives: patient referral management

Preventive Care through Remote Patient Monitoring – Power of RPM

Understanding Preventive Care Services

Preventive Care services are to help people stay healthy and to detect or diagnose health-related issues early while there is a higher chance of recovery. Preventive Care Services include periodic health check-ups, patient counseling, and screening to prevent health-related issues.

Remote Patient Monitoring and Its Acceptance

Remote Patient Monitoring is a method of healthcare delivery that is a part of Telehealth technology to gather patient data outside the traditional care settings. It is the use of specific technology to simplify the interaction between providers and patients at a remote location (home, nursing care facility, remote area or anywhere outside of conventional clinical settings. Remote patient monitoring is one of the tools that can bridge the current gap in patient engagement.

Currently, 88% of hospitals are investing or considering to invest in remote patient monitoring. In fact, 68 percent of physicians “strongly intend” to use remote monitoring technology in the future, according to a new study by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA).


how Remote Patient Monitoring help patients and payers?

How does Remote Patient Monitoring help providers?

Providers can use remote patient monitoring to manage the health of high-risk patients, patients at-risk for hospital readmissions, monitor patients with chronic conditions, track patients post-discharge, check on senior patients, and to increase value-based care adoption. Remote Patient Monitoring helps providers detect any changes in patients before it shows visible symptoms.

Related Article: The Role of Referral Management in Value-Based Health Care

How does Remote Patient Monitoring help patients?

Patient participation in the remote monitoring program helps patients avoid unnecessary clinic visits and potential emergency department visits(ER Visits). Remote patient monitoring provides monitoring and support at home to help patients reach their healthcare goals.

How does Remote Patient Monitoring help payers?

Remote patient monitoring connects all involved in the care cycle - providers, patients, and payers. Communication and exchange of information is much quicker and transparent which can help prevent emergencies, hospitalization, reduce readmissions, and mainly reduce costs. According to the KLAS Research report that surveying 25 healthcare organizations found 38% of healthcare organizations running RPM programs focused on chronic disease reported reduced admissions, and 17% cited cost reductions.

With such benefits it’s quite easy to understand why remote patient monitoring is burgeoning. As the RPM technology adoption continues to expand, it helps to have a positive effect on patients, providers, and the payers.

Adoption of various healthcare technology solutions are driven by various underlying factors like increasing healthcare costs, rise in baby boomer population, chronic conditions, and many more. Out of which chronic conditions are considered to be one of the main factors that need attention. More than 133 million Americans representing 45% of the U.S. population have at least one chronic disease. Chronic diseases are responsible for seven out of every 10 deaths in the United States, killing more than 1.7 million Americans every year.

Are you planning for Remote Patient Monitoring, Chronic Care Management, Telehealth, Care Management, Referral Management, or other similar solutions? Schedule a demo today! We are here to help you get started!

It’s time to stop faxing referrals – Why are we still faxing patient referrals?

One out of every three patients is referred to a specialist each year. These referrals are sent to specialists, imaging centers, etc., through multiple channels like phone calls, fax, emails, website forms, etc., and fax is the most commonly used channel. Despite the array of digital patient referral management software available in the market, health systems are still following the old school model of referring patients through fax machines and paper-based letters.  Ironically, there could be multiple barriers like the reasons listed below for not using the electronic referral communication software

  • Traditional workplace culture
  • Not having the right technology in place
  • Not understanding the software usage
  • Peers not using eReferrals 

Healthcare professionals need to understand the usability, security, and interoperability of the solutions available in the health IT market. Health systems need to adapt to more secure means to send and receive referrals. With that being said, Referral Management Solution is progressively vital for better patient experience and care coordination. Today, in most health systems referral workflows are poorly documented, insecurely sent and are not effective in providing quality care for patients.

Knowing the security consequences of maintaining paper-based systems and physical paper letters is critical – as they could be easily misplaced and accessed by unauthorized people. Some health systems still depend on their EMR to manage their referral process but they need to understand that EMR’s are not equipped enough to handle the end-to-end referral process. Health systems should understand the need of having a good patient referral solution.

Why do health systems need a good patient referral solution?

The healthcare industry is constantly scrutinized for inefficiencies in processes, systems, operations, etc. As a result, health systems are under more pressure to do more with fewer amenities. Inefficient referral processes lead to long lead times and are inconvenient to both patients and providers. A referral solution can streamline communication between the referring provider, receiving provider, patient and other healthcare providers, save time, enhance care quality and a lot more for both patients and providers.

Other Key Benefits of referral solution include

  • Reduced wait times for patients
  • Better referral tracking
  • Improved referral quality
  • Cost reduction
  • Enhanced operational efficiency
  • Secure transfer of patient information
  • Reduced referral leakage

Referral management solution is important for better patient experience, care coordination and to arrest patient leakage. Health systems lose millions of dollars due to referral leakage as every patient seeking care outside the network is lost revenue. Minimizing leakage is an increasingly key focus for many health systems. Health systems need to make substantial improvements in processing referrals efficiently, improve processes and invest in technologies. It is high time for health systems to stop receiving and sending unsafe fax referral and have a streamlined end-to-end referral solution in place.

A streamlined referral management solution has the potential to standardize the referral process, maximize efficiency in the referral process, and improve workflow through technology. Talk to our experts today and schedule a demo to understand more about our Patient Referral Management Solution.

Revenue lost due to patient leakage in hospitals and health systems

The last few years have been a tumultuous time for hospitals and health systems due to the high patient leakage rate. Even today, patient leakage is a key concern and remains an unsolved challenge in many of the health systems. Health systems are losing more than 20% revenue due to inefficient organizational referral processes, as a result, patients are opting to different care providers for their care needs. Identifying the gaps or latitude to go out of the system, and sealing this, is the basic step that health systems need to take in solving patient leakage challenge.

What are the main causes of patient leakage?

Here are some reasons why patient leakage happens

–          Referring physicians refer patients to out-of-network providers

–          Patients move out of the care network due to poor care coordination

–          Unavailability of a specialist within the care network

Patient Leakage and its consequences

Though in most hospitals patient leakage is contributing to significant revenue loss, this loss is ignored, and not given much importance. Health systems and hospitals need to consider this leakage extremely important. Non-coordinated or fragmented care is one of the main reasons for patient leakage. The point is to emphasize on some damaging consequences patient leakage can bring on care quality and patient health outcomes.

Understanding the actual causes of this leakage and taking tangible steps to address this challenge is vital. It is the responsibility of the health system to track and manage patient referrals in a better way with a solution for tracking leakages and referrals. Otherwise, it can damage the health system’s reputation, undermine its brand value, and even jeopardize its competitive edge.

Challenges in processes that cause patient leakage

Streamlining different processes for different aspects is required for better overall operational efficiency. One such process that needs attention to arrest leakage is the patient referral process. Health systems need to adapt to solutions that will help seal this leakage. HealthViewX helps referral coordinators in health systems to manage patient referral efficiently and improve care, performance, compliance, and reduce leakage.

The current referral process lacks certain mechanisms to make this process effective.  Hospitals and health systems need a referral solution in addition to an EMR to solve their referral challenges especially referral leakage.

An ideal referral solution for hospitals should have the following features

  • Multi-channel referral consolidation

Health systems have multiple access points for patients and chances are that health systems may miss following-up with some referrals. The solution needs to consolidate referrals from multiple sources like fax, email, phone calls, online forms, etc. It should integrate well to bring all of these referrals into one single queue and ensure not a single referral is missed.


  • Secure exchange of information

A HIPAA compliant solution that supports the secure exchange of sensitive patient information among the care providers involved in patient care is a must. The provider should be able to attach documents securely at any time for one another’s reference.


  • Patient referral history

Both the referring physician and the receiving provider should have access to the entire referral history. All required information right from the time a referral is initiated and consequent diagnosis reports, referral status, etc. should be available at any point of care.


  • Scheduler Integration

Patient convenience is one of the most important factors in providing care. Scheduling appointments as per patient convenience and automated reminders for both patient and provider about the appointment is mandatory.


  • Dashboard and referral insights

The solution has to give complete data of the referrals flowing into the health system. The number of referrals processed, number missed and many more as per the requirement of the health system. These data analytics should give the practice a clear picture of how referrals are handled and where the leakage is happening.  

Speak to HealthViewX solution experts to understand more about HealthViewX Referral Solution features that will help solve some of the challenges in the patient referral process and increase revenue through effective tracking. Schedule a demo today!