How to Leverage Your Software for Strategic Planning

Sponsored by: QS/1

• By David Kopf
• Jul 01, 2011

The power to collect, analyze and share data is integral to the success of any providers’ business. It’s hard to believe that less than a decade ago, a spreadsheet program and accounting software were the “brains” behind business operations, and strategic planning relied on hunches and what little data you were capable of capturing.

With today’s unprecedented industry challenges, including cuts, caps, competitive bidding and documentation pressures, providers must react efficiently and quickly to industry changes by analyzing data and making well-researched, sound business decisions. Data generated by HME software can show you your strengths, as well as where you might be able to cut and save some precious operating dollars.

Today, the non-use of software to measure your performance and infuse your strategic planning with important data would most likely leave you way behind your competition. Thankfully, HME software goes well beyond the spreadsheet and finance features of yesterday. They are important tools for improving your business, saving money and planning your company’s success. Here are some software features that can help you leverage your data to support your strategic planning efforts.

Dashboards — A dashboard is typically the software’s default screen that gives providers useful, bottom-line, executive-level data at a glance. Think of your software’s dashboard as a good homepage for a website. By looking at that one screen, you are able to easily find important, truncated data you need to know immediately. For example, you might find a real-time, automatically updated quick list of your top five best selling items for the day. And then by clicking on them, you will find more detailed data on the products and other related information. A dashboard can help providers understand which products are more profitable than others, and, therefore, which products to push to the forefront of their sales and marketing initiatives. Dashboards can display sales figures and trend data, as well.

Communication — Software with email and fax capability can let providers easily send out information to patients, referral sources, physicians, etc. Look for software that allows each patient to be classified by multiple product categories for targeted direct mail campaigns, and capture birthdays to alert you as to when to send out birthday cards. Another feature to look for is an order-scheduling module that alerts providers when it is time to call patients to see if they need a “next” delivery of supplies. Make sure you follow SPAM guidelines and understand that the privacy and security rules require providers to implement appropriate security procedures to protect the confidentiality of patient information. In short, providers have to either limit their email messages to patients to information that does not contain protected health information of the patient or provide a secure means of communicating with the patient. Some software packages create a secure provider/patient email channel (See HIPAA and HITECH Act.)

Audit preparation — Medicare audits are a fact of life, and software can help make you better prepared and less stressed. Providers must implement their own internal processes to assess claims before they are processed to see if they will pass muster. Software can automate this process for you. Also, document imaging and management have also become essential software tools. They help providers quickly store, file, share and retrieve any important documents related to a specific claim or patient.

Controlling delivery — Various HME software systems and related offerings are able to help providers easily generate efficient routes from the list of service calls and apportion them to each driver. Delivery management can generate the following days’ deliveries each evening, and in the morning, the drivers come in, are handed their pre-planned delivery routes and tickets for the day and set out on their rounds. However, creating sensible routes that minimize mileage is only part of the delivery efficiencies offered by software. Additionally, HME software systems can also help providers to ensure that each driver adheres to optimal gas mileage by not traveling to fast or too slow by approximating how long a driver should take between one patient address and another.

Here is a checklist of features you should consider having in your HME software system. Data from these features will be priceless regarding your strategic planning.

• Claims/Billing – Billing tools, authentication, and processing capabilities.
• Reporting/Executive View – Overview screens and “dashboard” views that help providers manage their businesses.
• Inventory Management – Inventory management and control features, such as barcoding and scanning.
• Ordering – Order creation, entry, processing, automation features.
• Audits – Capabilities to help providers deal with increased RAC, CERT, ZPIC and other audit requests.
• PECOS – Features to help ensure claims are coming from referral partners entered in CMS’s PECOS database.
• Delivery Management – Delivery operations and optimization features.
• Marketing – Reports and other capabilities that help providers better reach out to patients and partners.
• Online Community – Tools to help providers communicate and share best practices with each other.

This article originally appeared in the July 2011 issue of HME Business.