1. C A SE STUDY
Atlanta Women’s Specialists
Atlanta, GA
HealthMatics®
Office
AWS saves $134,000 per year, boosts revenues by $60,000 per year, and increases
new patient visits by 17 percent
BACKGROUND
Atlanta Women’s Specialists has two locations—in Atlanta and Alpharetta, GA. It logs
between 120 and 150 patients per day accounting for up to 34,000 gynecological visits
each year.
OPPORTUNITY
When Atlanta Women’s Specialists (AWS) first considered adopting electronic health
records (EHR), the physicians were using handwritten charts, which were difficult to
read. And because patients could visit either of two locations, staff was faxing charts
back and forth, and physicians found themselves waiting for the chart to arrive after the
patient was in the office.
Says Paul Barry, Practice Administrator, “The physicians didn’t like waiting for charts to
be faxed. And because we could fax only information about the previous visit, we were
increasingly concerned about patient safety because the physicians didn’t always have
complete patient information.”
The practice wanted an EHR to provide access to complete, legible information at both
locations and to make the practice more efficient. In 2002, AWS selected Allscripts’
HealthMatics EHR because it enabled the practice to manage the patient process and
workflow as it desired.
In 2005, AWS migrated to HealthMatics Ntierprise. Says Barry, “After exploring several
alternatives, we chose Ntierprise because Allscripts was a known entity and we felt
comfortable with them. We also wanted an integrated solution so we could easily
exchange information between the EHR and the practice management system.”
The practice has since upgraded to HealthMatics Office 2006, which includes several
important updates to the EHR.
IMPLEMENTATION AND TRAINING
AWS used Allscripts to implement and train its staff on the product. Says Barry,
“Everyone that went to key user training at the Allscripts office learned a lot about the
product. The onsite trainers did a good job as well. The training gave us the tools we
needed to get up and running faster.”
Customer Profile:
Obstetrics and Gynecology
6 physicians and 1 nurse
practitioner
23,000 patients annually
www.allscripts.com
“Giving patients access to patient
information has helped our practice
to increase new patient visits
by about 17% in 2006 over the
previous year by helping attract new
patients and distinguish AWS from
other ob-gyn practices.”
Paul Barry,
Practice Administrator
Atlanta Women's.indd 1 6/6/07 4:30:48 PM

2. C A SE STUDY
Atlanta Women’s Specialists
CLINICAL IMPROVEMENTS: BETTER DOCUMENTATION
With HealthMatics Office 2006, AWS physicians now use templates designed
specifically for obstetrics practices. Says Barry “The new obstetrics templates offer
significant advances in the way pregnancies are documented. They incorporate a better
flow sheet into which physicians can enter data, such as weight, blood pressure, and
urine testing values for glucose and protein. Physicians can review information from all
previous encounters and add to it—all on a single screen. This makes it easier to enter
data and to see how the pregnancy is progressing. The new templates also look better
in the printed form that we currently fax to the hospital.”
Says Yvette Smith, M.D., “Now, we can provide better care because we don’t have to
worry about misplaced data. And we can more easily compile and transfer information
to the hospital in a way that ensures that everyone can use and interpret it.”
In addition to improving the quality and completeness of documentation, the entire
chart is available electronically at both offices. Physicians also have the convenience of
accessing records from home via a secure VPN connection. This feature allows them
to stay current with their work and enables them to review and update charts after
hours—an especially useful tool when they are on-call and need to fax a record to the
hospital for a patient they are admitting.
EASIER COMMUNICATION WITH HOSPITALS, LABS, AND PHARMACIES
While the practice currently faxes records to the hospital when the pregnancy reaches
about 35 weeks, AWS is implementing a feature that will allow it to transmit these
records to the hospital electronically each week after 35 weeks to ensure that the
hospital has the most up to date information when a patient goes into labor.
HealthMatics EHR also simplifies the process of receiving data from other
organizations. It automatically populates patient records with lab results, pathology
reports, radiology reports, hospital discharge summaries and operative reports. The
interface eliminates time spent waiting for couriers and greatly improves the quality
of documents that were previously sent via fax. A new Patient Manager capability
makes it easier to keep up with incoming items. Says Barry, “Now, when lab results,
mammograms, ultrasound reports, or refill requests come in, the Patient Manager alerts
physicians right away.”
ePrescribing allows AWS physicians to send prescriptions directly to the pharmacy at the
click of a button. Says Smith, “Because ePrescribing removes people from the process,
there is less potential for errors while the drug interaction and allergy alerts are a nice
double check for patient safety. And the patients are happy because the prescription is
waiting for them when they are at the pharmacy.”
GREATER EFFICIENCY
Before implementing HealthMatics EHR the practice had up to 20 staff members
(about half of its staff) looking for paper charts. By allowing online access to charts, the
practice has eliminated the need to pull paper charts and has thus been able to reduce
medical records FTEs by about 5; with average salaries of about $25,000 per year,
“Now, we can provide better care
because we don’t have to worry about
misplaced data. And we can more
easily compile and transfer information
to the hospital in a way that ensures
that everyone can use and interpret it.”
Yvette Smith, M.D.
Atlanta Women's.indd 2 6/6/07 4:30:49 PM

3. C A SE STUDY
Atlanta Women’s Specialists
this saves the practice a total of about $125,000 per year. The electronic record also
eliminates the need for paper chart supplies; at an industry average of about $3 per
chart, the practice saves about $9,000 in charting costs for new patients.
BETTER COMMUNICATION WITH PATIENTS
AWS is also using the HealthMatics EHR to communicate with patients through its
Web portal. Using this portal, patients can request appointments, review and correct
demographic and insurance information, see their lab reports minutes after they are
reviewed by their physician, and even communicate with their physician via secure Web
messaging.
This online communication is praised by physicians and patients alike. Says Smith,
“The Web portal is really nice. It allows patients to access us in a way that they
couldn’t previously. For example, I had one patient with breast cancer. I sent her to
an oncologist, but she continued to send me email updates about once a month. It
made a huge difference in how she managed her cancer diagnosis. I’ve also found that
patients email me short questions when they need clarifications; it is much easier for
me to respond than through a phone call.”
The practice is convinced that providing patients with easier and faster access
to information has helped it grow. Says Barry, “Giving patients access to patient
information has helped our practice to increase new patient visits by about 17% in 2006
over the previous year by helping attract new patients and distinguish AWS from other
ob-gyn practices.”
PRACTICE MANAGEMENT
Because the HealthMatics Ntierprise solution is integrated with the EHR, the physicians
code their exams and transfer this information automatically to a certified coder who
double checks their work to ensure that the documentation supports a specific level of
office visit. It then sends in the claims using the iClaim billing clearinghouse service.
Says Barry, “Using HealthMatics Office, our providers discovered that their exams
justified a higher level of coding than they had been using. By increasing our coding
levels, we were able to increase our revenues by almost $60,000 per year without
worrying about audits.”
Because HealthMatics Ntierprise offers reporting and easy to use screens, the practice
finds it easier to follow up on unpaid claims and track its finances. Says Barry, “I use
these reports to present month-end information to physicians. It is also very easy to
generate a report with charges, collections and RVUs (relative value units) which
determine each physicians’ compensation by the value and the number of episodes of
care they provide.”
CONCLUSION
Overall, says Smith, “HealthMatics Office allows us to share information in a more
flexible manner and get information to patients faster. This makes our office much
more efficient and it allows us to provide better care.”
“Because ePrescribing removes people
from the process, there is less potential
for errors while the drug interaction and
allergy alerts are a nice double check
for patient safety. And the patients
are happy because the prescription is
waiting for them when they are at the
pharmacy.”
Yvette Smith, M.D.
Results
Saves $125,000 per year by reducing
medical records FTEs by 5
Reduces medical records expenses by
$9,000 per year
Increases revenues by nearly $60K
per year by supporting higher levels of
coding
New obstetrical templates improves
data entry and longitudinal data
tracking
Web portal helped the practice
increase new patient visits by 17% in
2006 over the previous year
Atlanta Women's.indd 3 6/6/07 4:30:50 PM