Misys Homecare Helps Large Organization
Improve Processes, Reduce Overhead Through Single Integrated
Technology
Large home care and hospice organizations manage incredible
amounts of paperwork, oftentimes resulting in a costly
and time-consuming challenge that threaten to overwhelm
staff. As a result, many IT managers are turning to
integrated systems that will help them better manage
reporting and integrate necessary tasks such as scheduling,
visit verification, bill processing, and more. As these
organizations grow, this challenge becomes even more
greater, and it becomes increasingly difficult to control
and coordinate business processes.
Genesee Region Home Care (GRHC) is one large agency
where the need for system integratation increased as
the organization grew its patient and employee base.
Based in Rochester, N.Y., GRHC employs more than 1,000
professional, paraprofessional and supervisory staff
who serve over 1,500 patients a day in the metropolitan
Rochester area of upstate New York. For years, the company
has relied very heavily on technology to coordinate
all aspects of patient care and administration –
a necessary adjunct to their business, according to
John Cauvel, IT manager.
“We’ve had computerized scheduling since
1995. With our volume, our reporting needs are huge,”
Cauvel said. “In the past, we were operating on
several different systems, and we wanted to consolidate
everything into one. When looking at systems that could
answer this need, we realized that Misys Homecare would
provide us with the vast majority of what we were looking
for, while other systems would only be able to provide
about 40% of what we needed.”
A product of Misys Healthcare Systems, Misys Homecare
is an industry leading home care system that improves
performance in virtually all aspects of an organization’s
operation, including clinical, financial, and administrative.
Designed for businesses of all sizes, Misys Homecare
is an integrated system that combines business, clinical,
and scheduling features into a single package.
Cauvel and his team looked at other applications, but
found that Misys Homecare provided the most impressive
benefits. “Other technologies weren’t as
well integrated. Misys Homecare provides us with great
process improvement by integrating activities from scheduling
through payroll. This is where we’ve gotten the
most benefit. Billing has also been greatly simplified.”
In fact, Misys Homecare has allowed the company to
make great strides in bill processing. “With Misys
Homecare, creating a bill is easy,” Dave Sanford,
accountant, GRHC, said. “You verify that a visit
was completed and that a bill was produced. After this
is done, it’s just a couple of clicks of a button
to get the bill out. The integration of the system and
its ability to push jobs to the payroll system is very
smooth and effective. With Misys Homecare, we’ve
also gained process control because we are now assured
that the hours that we are paying for are the hours
that we’re billing for. Misys Homecare has certainly
improved our level of process control.”
GRHC also receives reimbursement more rapidly. “The
time that it takes to get reimbursed has been shortened
because of the quickness of electronic submission,”
Yvette Illardo, billing manager, GRHC, said. “We’re
able to spend a lot more time on denials and getting
stuff out faster.”
For a large organization like GRHC, speeding up the
process is important, but so is being able to manage
remote employees. Fortunately, Misys Homecare –
which allows field staff to enter notations and clinical
records electronically – has helped in that area,
as well. “We have several small offices, and our
field staff do not like to spend their time coming into
the office if they can help it,” Cauvel said.
“The kind of communication you can have with them
through Misys Homecare has made it less necessary for
nurses to come in. Now, we can have them come in when
it’s meaningful, rather than all of the time.”
All of this increased efficiency has helped GRHC improve
its bottom line. In particular, the company has seen
a cost savings as a result of workforce reduction, which
alone saves the organization several hundred thousands
of dollars per year. “We’ve reduced back-office
staff by five full-time employees,” Illardo said.
That savings – and all of the other benefits
that Misys Homecare provides – has helped management
at GRHC gain something very valuable: a more substantial
margin it can use to reward employees and improve patient
care.
Visit us online at www.misyshealthcare.com to learn more about Misys
Homecare, or call (800) 888-936-9301.
