HAMILTON HEALTH CENTER, INC.
Grant: $765,480 - Health Resources and Services Administration - Jun. 25, 2009
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Award Description: There are four projects included as part of the CIP grant: 1) Walnut Street Renovation; 2) Electronic Health Records; 3) Telephone Upgrade; and 4) Building Expansion. 1) HHC's primary Dental location at 1650 Walnut Street is in need of two facility improvements. A new roof will be installed to eliminate leakage and spot-flooding issues currently being experienced. In addition, additional heating capacity will be installed to provide a healthier climate for HHC's patients and employees during colder temperature seasons. 2) HHC intends to implement the EHR portion of the EHS CareRevolution Application, a fully integrated EHR and Practice Management system. The EHR component will be implemented in three phases: 1) Clinical Console Manager, Medication Management/eRx and some basic charting; 2) Laboratory and Other orders/results and Care Express; and 3) Custom Medcin Forms/Templates and remaining Chart Documentation. The following benefits will be realized: patient safety, patient satisfaction, provider/clinical staff productivity, and provider/encounter documentation and coding. Faster and easier access to the patient's medical record will facilitate improved case and encounter management. The Clinical Console Manager (CCM) tracks patient flags, medical calls, lab orders/results, etc., thus far reducing other types of common errors. The EHR Care Express module contains functionality that can significantly improve patient flow. This module provides a real-time status of all patients throughout the clinics. The information will be used to conduct ongoing patient flow analyses to eliminate bottlenecks and further improve throughput. Provider and clinical staff productivity will increase after they become proficient in its use. The CCM allows the Physicians to organize daily events such as patient encounters (from the scheduling module), correspondence, lab results, notes/dictation, etc. Provider/encounter documentation and coding will improve as a result of the electronic capture of encounter information including symptoms, treatments, notes/transcriptions, past and present medications, allergies, etc. Claims coding will automatically be generated by the system based on the selected treatment documentation thereby improving coding consistency throughout the Provider organization. 3) HHC?s telephone upgrade includes the replacement of an antiquated, failure-prone Voicemail system with a new network/digital Voicemail system to provide requisite telephone services for HHC patients and stakeholders. The new system will provide updated messaging/directory/phone tree services to callers on HHC's main number. It will also be moved to HHC's new location and be attached to the new PBX system at that site. The telephone/PBX upgrade project will eliminate existing problems, such as: incoming call capacity, internal call routing, voicemail, and self-administration. 4) HHC is experiencing unprecedented growth in the demand for its services in the medical, dental, and social service areas. Its current facilities are old, too small, and in need of constant repair. The first phase in the Building Expansion project was the hiring of real estate consultants, a construction consultant, and an architectural firm to negotiate the lease and design a medical facility out of a warehouse building.
Project Description: Improvements to be made through the Walnut Street Renovation project are pending a building review for local/historical ordinances that may have to be addressed prior to the start of work. The following project activities have been completed for the Electronic Health Records project: secured software licensing from vendor; established project team, roles, and responsibilities; finalized project plan that includes phased scope, schedule, and support requirements; finalized HHC formulary for use by the Medication management and eRx components; partially completed clinical templates for information collection; and conducted three system demonstration/Q&A sessions with HHC clinical providers. The new voicemail system has been specified and ordered. HHC has completed the new messaging, directory, and phone tree logic. Testing will commence in mid-to-late October with installation scheduled for November 2009. Work on the new building is proceeding. A lease has been signed for 29 years and 11 months and HHC is working with the architects. No funds have been drawn down for this project due to a building review for local/historical ordinances as required by a grant?s review team.
Jobs Summary: As a result of this funding, HHC has been able to hire a full-time (1.0 FTE) Health Information Manager (HIM) to aid in the implementation of the EHR project. The HIM is a managerial position, directly responsible for the creation, storage, maintenance, purging and elimination of all patients' clincial records in accordance with HIPAA and other relevant laws and regulations. In addition, this individual is responsible for adherence to company policies, as well as setting department goals, planning, policy and procedure development, quality assurance, and improvement. The HIM promotes quality clinical care by ensuring access to clinical information in a timely fashion and through participation in clinical and operational performance improvement projects. At the vendor level, 1.60 FTEs have been retained. These positions consist of a 1.0 FTE Architect and a 0.50 FTE Assistant Architect at a Harrisburg-based architectural services firm. The firm is providing architectural services for the design and documentation of HHC's new outpatient facility. Finally, 0.10 FTE Project Manager has been retained at the construction company. Services being provided include preconstruction planning and management. (Total jobs reported: 3)
Project Status: Less Than 50% Completed
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