Hematology Oncology Associates
Hematology Oncology Associates of Albuquerque, New Mexico (HOA) is a single-site medical oncology center serving the community of Albuquerque and surrounding areas. The practice includes six providers and many support staff offering comprehensive care for adult patients with cancers or blood disorders. In addition to standard patient cancer treatment, HOA offers genetic screening and counseling for patients and family members with hereditary cancers. And, they have been offering cutting edge technology to their patients in the form of clinical trials for over twenty years.
So, it’s no surprise that when Kari Young, Practice Administrator at HOA, came across MedADVIZOR, another cutting edge technology, she was intrigued. It happened on a visit to a clinic in St. Louis that was using IMPAC’s MOSAIQ EMR software, along with MedADVIZOR. They recommended it for its superior functionality and ease of use. HOA eventually purchased and implemented the software tool in 2008 and has been using MedADVIZOR ever since.
Kari has found the Financial Analysis Dashboard particularly helpful for budgeting, strategic planning, and cost center analysis. MedADVIZOR’s fast data mining capability and graphic, interactive visualizations have made analysis in these areas quick and easy. Kari noted that, “Five years ago, one item on my wish list was to be able to press a button and see a report.” That wish has become a reality! What used to take weeks of non-stop research and manipulation to create Excel spreadsheets now takes Kari only a couple of hours. For Kari, the key benefit to her and her practice has been substantial time savings and the ability to take on other projects.
Kari noted that having all the data available in a visual format for the providers to see during meetings was also a significant part of its value. HOA’s physicians found the graphical display of their data, including their highest revenue-producing CPT codes and which providers were most revenue-producing for the practice, helpful in furthering their understanding of the practice’s strengths as well as areas for improvement.
When it comes to strategic planning, Kari has used MedADVIZOR to analyze and ameliorate HOA’s position with regard to both their payer and referral mixes. MedADVIZOR enables her to quickly and easily see the patterns and trends in the data in order to make sure they are not too dependent on any one payer or referring source and eliminate exposure/risk. MedADVIZOR has also helped in the area of marketing, ensuring they are communicating well with their top referrers and their target customers for the center.
The software also helps for cost center analysis in one of their niche businesses, Genetics Counseling. MedADVIZOR enables Kari to easily filter HOA’s data down to the revenue generation associated with the particular physician who serves as the Genetics Counselor. She can quickly drill down to a single year, single provider, specific CPT codes, and consults, in order to identify what revenue Genetics Counseling produced around patient visits as compared with other types of treatments. She can then answer the question, “Are the expenditures justifying the Genetics Counseling cost center?”
Kari has lots of ideas for expanding the use of their Clinical Analysis Dashboard to include chart review, tracking of critical outcomes, evaluating standards of care to determine whether HOA is excelling or simply meeting standards, and tracking clinical trials. MedADVIZOR can also enable her to quickly and easily identify which patients meet the criteria for research and tracking as set by the New Mexico Tumor Registry. Other applications include: denial tracking, volume/counts data analysis, scheduling analysis, and tracking patient flow. In light of the easy and rapid data mining for Kari’s financial and clinical analysis, the clear, easy to understand visualization capabilities for the physicians and other stakeholders, and the future benefit potential, HOA is very pleased with the return on their investment in MedADVIZOR.
