The Challenges of Electronic Documentation
Since the passage of HIPAA legislation in 1996, major health care providers
have sought ways to efficiently manage expanded patient privacy rights and
requirements, while increasing electronic data exchanges. The changes brought
about by HIPAA, including the implementation of many new policies and
procedures, have led to a series of paradigm shifts in the health care industry
that have notably increased the compliance burden on health care providers.
Similarly, the passage of Sarbanes-Oxley in 2002 — in the wake of Enron-type
corporate accounting scandals — added another layer of critical organizational
concerns to the mix by way of heightened corporate governance regulations. One
key health care related issue set in motion by Sarbanes-Oxley revolves around
data management and compliance brought about by the growth of the Internet and
the expanded reliance on electronic documents and communications.
Many savvy health care executives,
who are well aware of HIPAA requirements, are just beginning to address the
growing issues surrounding data integrity for their businesses. Ensuring that
the documents you create, store, send and receive electronically are what they
should be, is becoming a critical business process need.
Today, with most documents being generated and exchanged via e-mail, online
and other electronic methods, it is easy for people to make subtle changes to a
document — either maliciously or accidentally — that pass through undetected by
the human eye or automated controls currently in place. These minor changes
often cause major headaches for an organization with regards to record-keeping,
compliance with Medicare and Medicaid policies and procedures, claims
processing by payer companies, and even in protecting patients’ privacy rights.
The inability to easily identify where a document’s integrity begins and ends
also raises questions about individuals’ identity protection.
Virtually all electronic communication, fax, e-mails and mailed hard copies
are subject to tampering. Sometimes these changes are obvious, other times they
are not. Regardless, unintended changes, errors or omissions can cause
significant problems in operations or compliance when the integrity of these
documents comes into question.
The integrity challenge is particularly complex in the health care industry,
which is lagging in the definition of true standards for electronic
communication. In addition to the heavy regulatory environment, which leads to
a substantial paper-handling burden, the way information is shared also varies
from constituent to constituent within the industry. For example, while home
medical equipment (HME) suppliers are rapidly moving to Web-based and other
electronic solutions, the majority of physicians today prefer to send documents
such as prescriptions, physician orders or Certificates of Medical Necessity
(CMNs) via fax. Physicians are less comfortable, at present, with electronic
alternatives. On the other hand, HMEs and pharmacies have moved quickly toward electronic
communications, although paper continues to play a dominant role as
e-prescribing slowly makes progress.
Verifying the authenticity of all of the required documentation in the
industry can be daunting. Verifying in a way that is cost-effective and
non-intrusive to established business processes is an even more formidable
task. In today’s environment, however, executives have little choice other than
to explore automated, electronic ways of overcoming the challenge. They must
remain compliant, grow revenue, retain existing customers and stay competitive
at the same time. The question is, how?
A Solution for Today and Tomorrow
Technology solutions do exist in the market today to facilitate all types of
communication and to authenticate document integrity. HME providers can select
an electronic workflow solution for online processing of CMNs and physician
orders. Look for solutions that are industry-approved, regulation-compliant and
can integrate digital signatures and physician credentialing features, while
providing tamper-detection through content authentication technology.
Additional features such as a robust forms engine, attachment-handling
capabilities, document tracking and linking, batch processing, and more, enable
online-to-fax and fax-to-online communications for HMEs to physicians, payers
or others — and back.
These types of solutions incorporate robust time-stamping technology, and
certain solutions offer the capability to apply the United States Postal
Service Electronic Postmark for trusted third-party verification of document
integrity. The benefits of using technology solutions to authenticate document
integrity include: reduce total processing time, improve staff productivity,
shorten payment cycles, simplify forms processing, centralize and archive
documents digitally, and streamline compliance. These solutions also ensure
that documents and their contents are protected and provide irrefutable
evidence of the who, what and when for each transaction or document processed.
HME companies such as American HomePatient, Brentwood, Tenn.,and Advanced
Homecare, Greensboro, N.C., are utilizing Authentidate’s CareCert and CareFax
to support their reimbursement processes to implement physicians’ preferred
modes of working, whether fax or electronic. These companies recognize that a
successful electronic solutions approach must not only deploy strong,
industry-standards-based technology and HIPAA compliance, but also adapt to the
multiple modes of operation of the constituents they deal with, in order to
accelerate their own move to efficiency. Only then can they attempt to stay
ahead of the reimbursement challenges posed by increasing regulatory compliance
requirements and caps by payers such as Medicare.
As time progresses and physician adoption of electronic solutions gains
momentum, more fax and paper flow will be substituted with electronic
processes, leading to further reductions in the HME’s cost base. However, being
able to electronically handle both fax and electronic documents allows companies
to mitigate the risks associated with slower adoption of electronic solutions
by their constituencies.
Moving forward, health care executives must begin to recognize the
challenges posed by growing cost pressures in the face of stricter corporate oversight
and fiduciary requirements. New ways must be sought to overcome these
challenges head on. Technology solutions do exist today to help medical
providers update, enhance and automate their key business processes, while also
allowing their constituents — particularly doctors — to do business within
their own comfort zones.