Irene Froehlich outlines 10 reasons why medical practitioners should start e-prescribing now that will help physicians increase overall efficiency and patient care.
By now, it’s safe to say that the vast majority of medical practitioners have heard of electronic prescription management, more commonly known as “E-prescribing.”
But for those who aren’t yet familiar with it: e-prescribing is the computer-based electronic generation, transmission and filling of a medical prescription, with the purpose of modernizing and replacing the traditional paper-based handwritten prescriptions. Having prescriptions generated and sent electronically eliminates issues such as handwriting illegibility, misplacing the prescription before it makes it to the pharmacy, and the likelihood of prescriptions being placed in the waste basket instead of being filled.
But e-prescribing provides many more benefits than simply generating a prescription and electronically sending or faxing it directly to the pharmacy. It also helps physicians increase overall efficiency, allowing them and their staff to devote more time to reimbursable tasks and individual patient care, all of which can help generate additional revenue while improving patient outcomes.
In fact, here are 10 great reasons why medical practitioners should begin e-prescribing today:
1. E-prescribing can help substantially reduce 7,000 patient deaths and 1.5 million patient injuries that occur each year as a result of adverse drug events (ADE’s).
2. Medicare providers who write e-prescriptions for 25 unique patient encounters prior to December 31st, 2012 can receive a 1% bonus on their reimbursables in 2013 and avoid a 2% Medicare penalty in 2014.
3. Greater adoption of e-prescribing can save the U.S. healthcare system between $140 and $240 billion over the next 10 years.
4. More than 50% of practices in the US employing between two and 10 physicians adopted an e-prescribing system in 2011.
5. Physicians can purchase an award-winning e-prescribing system that costs just a few cents more per day than an average cup of coffee.
6. Physicians can utilize e-prescribing without having to buy or install any additional hardware or eliminate their paper charts.
7. Electronic prescriptions can be securely written from laptops, mobile phones, or iPads connected to any wireless network, allowing prescribers to write and/or renew prescriptions even when not in the office.
8. E-prescribing can reduce by up to 50% the average amount of time spent in dealing with questions, clarifications, and refill requests for paper-based prescriptions
9. E-prescribing allows physicians to easily access a patient’s formulary and select cost-effective prescriptions, increasing the likelihood patients will comply with prescribed treatment.
10. E-prescribing can result in an average savings of 336.7 hours and $15,769 per year per full‐time equivalent physician, according to a Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) study .
Interested in learning more about e-prescribing and how it can help you reduce costs and increase efficiency for your practice? Click here
Irene Froehlich is the Sr. Director of Communications at DrFirst where this article was first posted.
Featured image credit: http://pharmacytechnologyblog.com
