What Can You Do with 9 ½ Minutes?

As medical offices across the country are switching to electronic health record systems, an end goal every practice hopes to achieve is simple: increased efficiency. This could refer to better time management, improved billing, quicker access to patient records, or a combination of these.

Many of our clients have been able to achieve their goals, simply by eliminating chunks of time from a process that is repeated 30, 40, 50 times a day: patient note documentation. While it takes about 11 minutes to document a note with a traditional point-and-click EHR, ChartLogic users can document unique notes in 90 seconds or less, even if it’s for a new patient.

This means that on average, a physician saves nine and a half minutes per note, and it doesn’t even have to be transcribed later on. Of course, doctors don’t have to get creative to fill the extra time afforded them by more efficient note documentation. Some doctors may choose to spend the extra time with their current patients. Others may decide to bring in more patients to increase practice revenue. Many doctors are able to go home earlier than they have for years and have more time for family and hobbies.

There’s a reason why the phrase “time is money” is cliché; time saved is worth gold when it allows you to do something better or to do something you wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. EHRs, especially when built around command-and-control voice functionality, are a great tool for improving productivity and efficiency throughout the office, which in turn tends to improve life outside the office.

The meaningful use incentives provided by the government to encourage EHR use are nice, but the logic behind EHR is what allows doctors to succeed, even if it’s something as simple as saving nine-and-a-half minutes on documenting a note.