Leaving the paper trail (and file room) behind...
With patient records stored in five locations, including one off-campus location, Maury Regional Medical Center's health information management department was constantly retrieving and returning patient records — a highly laborious process that was further complicated when the department inherited additional patient records from a newly acquired clinic.
In December 2008, EDCO provided the necessary labor and transportation to move Maury Regional's file room consisting of more than 5,000 boxes to its SecureStore facility. EDCO's front-end verification process enhances retrieval time by providing a computerized control list for easy searching, as well as fields to aid in reducing the cost of segregating records when it’s time to destroy them — both of which have greatly simplified the hospital’s once fragmented records department. “For example, I asked EDCO to put adults in one category and minors in another category, and while that sounds very simple, it’s actually a huge process,” says Busby.
Maury Regional now saves $105,000 annually due to newly leasable office space that was previously used to store files and $24,000 annually from reduced staffing. The HIM department also decreased its previous 24-hour coverage hours and now provides coverage from 6 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
[Solutions provided through the VHA network.]
-- Jennifer Busby, Director of HIM for Maury Regional Medical Center
