When Virginia’s leading healthcare system wanted to improve its daily flow of information, DOMA delivered
Sentara Healthcare System is a Virginia based, non-profit healthcare facility with nationally recognized award-winning hospitals, physicians, leading-edge services, comprehensive health plans and the country’s largest clinical database. Sentara has consistently ranked among the best top integrated healthcare networks in the country in Modern Healthcare’s fact-based ranking. Garnering the number one position in 2001, Sentara is the only health care system on the East Coast to be ranked in the top 10 all seven years this survey has been conducted.
Sentara’s Medical Transport department was inundated with information from several of Sentara’s other departments without a central repository, making the management of this data impossible. Required Pre-hospital Patient Care Reports (PPCR), Evaluation of Benefits (EOBs), Physician Certification Statement (PCS) forms, and claims submissions resulted in the copying, filing and mailing of over 300 documents every day. Costs incurred involved additional work dedicated to the handling of claims; miscellaneous costs associated with faxing, filing, mailing, copying, plus the percentage of backlog that resulted from the length of time to complete documentation. Ideally, Sentara wanted a way to organize documents for easy tracking, filing and processing and to store the documents in one central location that could be accessed across departments if documents were ever needed.
DOMA implemented a secure, full-service, web based document management application to organize the paper flow in a centralized location and customized specifically to enable staff to scan various forms directly to the Internet. The Sentara staff was then able to view these documents securely from various locations, both on-site and from remote areas. With the implementation of this system, Sentara has been able to track, file and archive their forms on a daily basis. By having immediate access to their documents, Sentara achieved a higher level of customer support and satisfaction. The greatest overall benefits have been the economy of time and storage space and the efficiency of personnel. Given the rapid and easy implementation, efficiency and cost benefits were noticed almost immediately. Claim submission backlog was reduced in half with storage, filing, mailing and copying costs reduced by 75 percent.
