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Dirty Patient Data Can Have Severe Consequences for Healthcare Providers

September 9, 2020/13220 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, Connected Health, Data Integrity, Duplicate Medical Records, EHR, Facial Reciognition, healthcare, Medical Identity Theft, Patient Data, Patient Identification, Patient Matching, Patient Outcomes, Patient Safety /by Matt Gibson

The US healthcare system has always been facing problems that stopped it from realizing its full potential. These issues are longstanding barriers to providing immaculate healthcare services to patients, and thus affect healthcare outcomes for all involved. One of these issues has been the “dirty” patient data accumulating within EHR systems over the years. With the COVID-19 pandemic causing even more issues like the unprecedented financial strain, layoffs, restructuring and so on, providers need to ensure that the patient information within their facilities is accurate, consistent and relevant. Let’s look at what unclean patient data is, how it affects patients and providers and how RightPatient can ensure the cleanest patient data with accurate patient identification.

Patient data

A brief definition

In the simplest terms, patient data refers to a single patient’s medical information – medications, medical history, vitals, illnesses and so on. Such data is critical in making informed decisions regarding the patient in question. What should be the current or future course of action and how to best handle the needs of the patient are some common examples.

From the explanation, it is clear why clean patient data is important for both caregivers and their recipients. Let’s look at the other side of the coin: dirty data.

“Dirty” patient information

By now, it should be quite clear what dirty data means. Whenever the data is inaccurate, incomplete, inconsistent, obsolete or corrupt, it is considered “dirty”. Unclean patient data can lead to a lot of problems for any given healthcare provider. It impacts everyday operations, makes effective data sharing difficult and impacts healthcare outcomes, among other issues. Let’s have a more detailed look at the common ones.

Effects of unclean patient data

Inaccuracy and inefficient operations

Imagine if a patient goes to their healthcare provider for a checkup. The registrar types in the patient’s name: several medical records pop up on the screen, all pertaining to the same patient. Understandably, this can confuse the registrar. They are faced with a difficult choice: either go through all the patient records and find out the accurate one or create a new one entirely. The former case will take up a lot of time, while the latter will just create another duplicate medical record within the system. Both of these are consequences of having unclean data within the system.

Huge losses

According to Gartner, unclean data can cost an organization anywhere from $9.7 to $14.2 million. For US healthcare providers, however, it’s an entirely different figure. AHIMA stated that duplicate medical records can cost up to $40 million for any given provider, while a health system having several facilities can house up to 20% duplicate records.

Imagine if a patient is treated with another patient’s medical information. When the record holder gets the bill for services they did not use, they’ll simply contact their insurance provider regarding the matter. This will lead to a denied claim. Thus, inaccurate data can lead to denied claims as well – costing around $4.9 million on average for the average health system.

Patient safety is compromised

One of the biggest issues of unclean data is that it impacts patient safety. One patient will receive inaccurate and even dangerous treatment because they are being treated based on an entirely different patient’s medical record. Even if it is the same patient, if there are multiple records under their name, each record will have inconsistent and incomplete information about the patient, leading to improper care, medications and procedures. All in all, healthcare outcomes will not be as expected as patient safety and quality of care is jeopardized severely. This can affect a provider’s ratings as well. Patients will not be happy if they are not receiving unreliable healthcare services. Thus, clean data is critical to improving quality and safety in healthcare.

Non-compliance issues

This one is quite new. However, most healthcare providers know this and are working on it: e-notifications support.

The CMS rule mandates that all caregivers having EHR systems must ensure they support e-notifications by May 1st, 2021. During any ADT event, the provider needs to send e-notifications to the patient’s caregivers, whether they be established primary care practitioners, post-acute providers & suppliers or any other entity primarily responsible for the patient’s care. This is done to boost positive healthcare outcomes and improve care coordination. If the data is unclean, providers will end up sending false alerts either to the wrong provider or the wrong patient.

In any case, unclean data will cause non-compliance issues, penalties and might even jeopardize CMS provider agreements.

Lower ROI

Health systems and hospitals have been investing significantly in population health management, big data, analytics and similar projects they find promising. The efficacy of these systems depends on high-quality data being fed into them. When data is corrupted due to duplicate and overlay records, those investments are diluted, leading to lower ROI.

Keep patient data clean with RightPatient

One of the best ways to ensure that patient data integrity is maintained is by identifying the accurate patient record from the get-go. That’s where we can help.

RightPatient is the leading patient identification platform that ensures data integrity is maintained within EHRs. It is a touchless, photo-based platform used by leading healthcare providers.

By making sure that you identify your patients accurately every time, you can avoid duplicate medical records, prevent medical identity theft, eliminate financial issues related to dirty data, improve patient safety and quality of care. Also, you can send out proper e-notifications to the accurate caregivers, eliminating any non-compliance penalties.

By ensuring accurate and consistent data that can be used by the aforementioned investments (population health management, big data, analytics, etc.), RightPatient improves ROI for healthcare providers, creating a win-win scenario for everyone.

Contact us now to know how RightPatient works and how we can help you ensure the cleanest data via positive patient identification.

Another industry expert in favor of an effective patient identifier

October 23, 2019/6402 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, EHR, healthcare, Patient Errors, Patient Identification, Patient Matching, Patient Outcomes, Patient Safety /by Matt Gibson

It has been a long, continuous, and never-ending fight for the unique patient identifier which has not been without its own share of controversies. At the moment, Congress is thinking about whether it should give the green signal regarding the financing of a unique patient identifier to be used across the health systems and hospitals in the US. Now, Julie Dooling, another prominent healthcare expert of the American Healthcare Information Management Association (AHIMA), has given her views regarding how an effective patient identification platform can change the game. Such a solution can generate accurate patient identifications with the existing electronic health records within any hospital that aims at helping and improving patient safety as well as to eliminate any detected fraud in the process. Thankfully, such a solution exists – more on that later.

Patient matching – how hard could it be. That’s what may come to the minds of many. However, the truth is precisely the opposite when it comes to matching patients to their actual records, let alone duplicates which may be exceptionally complicated and thereby, making the failure rate to be quite significant. Moreover, according to Ms. Dooling, 8-12% of errors exist due to the duplicate records created for the same patient. Here is where the patient identification solution will come into play and it will identify the correct records for the patients every time, according to her.

However, it is not only AHIMA – a lot of health systems, hospitals, as well as other prominent healthcare organizations have been clamoring for a solution and are thus demanding for the abolishment of the archaic ban on funding and researching for a unique patient identifier by the Department of Health and Human Services which could be used nationwide.

HIPAA came into effect in 1996 and had a prerequisite for making reliable patient identification systems so that meaningful health information could be generated. However, as said multiple times, privacy concerns were cited by many parties, which ultimately led to the restriction in the development and funding for a national patient identifier. The opposition reasoned that medical records would be exposed and cybercriminals could steal data.

However, that did ultimately happen, and we see news regarding such cybercrimes every day. Also, fraudulent activities are quite common regarding the health information of patients. Ms. Dooling says that the consequences of privacy concerns such as healthcare fraud, which were given as reasons for not opting for a UPI, are happening even without its existence. Ms. Dooling also added that if a UPI is to be made, as everyone is clamoring for it now, it will take a lot of effort since it has to be nationwide and also should have interoperability, which is the primary concern. She also stated her concern regarding privacy issues; they would not be collecting Social Security Numbers so that the people can heave a sigh of relief regarding this matter.

Funding, researching, and creating such a solution would take a lot of time and resources. However, what if such a solution exists? Wouldn’t it be that much more feasible? Fortunately, such an exact solution exists.

A lot of health systems are already using RightPatient, which was made with accurate patient identification in mind. It is a biometric patient identification platform that locks the patient records with the biometric data of the patients. Once a patient registers their biometric data using RightPatient, it gets attached to their EHRs, and they can be identified within seconds whenever they visit the hospital. Also, this reduces medical identity theft and the medical records cannot be accessed without the biometric data of the patients, which can be irises or fingerprints. Likewise, health systems are using RightPatient to reduce denied claims as well, since they are eliminating patient misidentifications within their premises. It improves patient safety, enhances revenue cycle, and reduces millions of losses while saving both lives and money in the process. It does fit the bill for being a UPI since it is a tried and tested solution for accurate patient identification.

Source: Making the Case for National Unique Patient ID

Patient identification error causes yet another grave mistake

July 17, 2019/8360 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, healthcare, Iris Recognition, Patient Errors, Patient Identification, Patient Matching, Patient Safety /by Matt Gibson

Another day, another mistaken patient identification error. However, it was a bit different in this case. Two sisters were informed that their brother was on life support and that is the premise of the whole fiasco.

The sisters, Rosie Brooks, and Brenda Bennett-Johnson received a call from an official that someone they believed to be their brother Alfonso was breathing with the help of a ventilator at Mercy Hospital and Medical Center of Chicago. However, the sisters stated that they didn’t talk much to their brother. The call started with someone enquiring about relatives of Alfonso, and Brooks replied that she was the sister, and then the official broke the news – that he was fighting for his life in the ICU, explaining that he was beaten quite severely, especially the face.

The Chicago police had found the man beaten to a pulp, and according to reports had neither clothes nor any means of identification on his body. A police spokesperson said that witnesses of the incident identified the injured man as one Elijah Bennett. Later on, he was rushed to the hospital and was on life support.

During his time in the hospital, as nobody came looking for him, the hospital staff had to take the help of the police in identifying him. The spokesperson said that their database had no “Elijah Bennett,” however, they did find “Alfonso Bennett.” The police later on handed over a picture so that the hospital could help identify any family members of the unfortunate patient. All these events led to the call to Brooks, yet another patient identification error.

When the sisters rushed to the hospital, they failed to identify the man as their brother Alfonso. However, CPD kept saying that it was their brother. According to the nurse, police used the help of mugshots to identify him, but due to budgetary issues, a proper ID could not be made.

However, the patient’s situation was worsening, and the sisters faced a challenging situation – whether or not to remove his life support. With immeasurable sadness, they had to sign papers stating that this man was their brother and to remove his life support, and as expected, the man passed away, unfortunately.

After this series of events, the story did not end. After the untimely death of the “brother,” the sisters started making preparations for his funeral, to give him a proper sendoff. Before they could carry out the planning, however, what happened next was a scene out of a dramatic movie – the brother, Alfonso, walked right through the front door of the house of the one sister! She shouted over the phone to her other sister, exclaiming that the brother they had thought was dead is very much alive and healthy and that it almost gave her a heart attack.

However, this newfound relief and happiness quickly turned into sadness, regret, and remorse – they realized that they had given the green light to end the life of a stranger, thinking it was their brother. They shared how they felt with the media and that they were extremely remorseful about deciding everything about someone unknown. However, the police, later on, identified the person with the help of fingerprints and started looking for his family. Everyone involved was deeply disturbed by this incident and thinking that there are no procedures or strategies to ensure such cases do not happen again in the future. However, this is not an isolated incident, as a very similar situation occurred in 2018.

Many people are worried that as these incidents are recurring, there is no way to avoid this. They are wrong. RightPatient would have helped the situation in reducing such errors. It is a biometric patient identification system which, and with the help of iris scanning modality, it reduces not only any kind of patient identification error but is also safe, convenient, and quick. Since no physical contact is required, all it needs is a glance from the patient for registration and matching – thus being hygienic and easy to use for both patients and physicians. All these features help to enhance patient safety as well as improve the patient experience, reducing claims by 35% and saving a lot of costs of healthcare systems in the process.

The True Meaning of Patient Identification Innovation

June 8, 2017/8521 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, Facial Reciognition, Future of Biometrics, healthcare, Infection Control, Medical Identity Theft, Patient Identification, Patient Safety /by John Trader

The following post on patient identification innovation was submitted by Michael Trader, Co-Founder of RightPatient®

I get it. Change is hard. It’s human nature to resist change, yet as we are often reminded, true progress in life comes when we step “outside the box” and “outside of our comfort zone” to change our perspective and foster growth (thank you mom and dad for that advice) Despite our inherent inability to accept it, change is inevitable and a fact of life. Anywhere you look around, change exists in one form or another and there is little doubt that change can be challenging.

Patient identification “innovation” is defined by the ability to address both present and future complexities and nuances of patient behaviors.

In the healthcare industry, patient identification as we know it is going through radical changes. While this may have been breaking news a few years ago, most in the industry are now well aware that traditional patient identification methods are no longer effective and have the potential to place a patient in harm’s way via medical errors, duplicate records, and medical identity theft. As more healthcare organizations recognize and understand the importance of abandoning antiquated patient ID procedures in favor of more modern, secure technology to improve patient safety I think it’s important to put into context what it actually means to be “innovative” in patient identification. In other words, I often see the word “innovative” used to describe technology solutions built to only address one facet of patient ID instead of being designed to not only address the complexities of today’s environment, but also equipped to cover the challenges of patient identification in the future.

I recently wrote a post for Health Data Management where I discuss how the behavior of current and future generations plays an important role in designing patient ID technology that has the capability to ID a patient no matter where they enter and exit along the care continuum. This is an important innovation “ingredient” that must be built into any modern patient identification solution and any technology that limits where and when healthcare organizations can accurately identify a patient is simply not innovative.

How does RightPatient define patient identification innovation? I’m glad you asked.

When we began our patient identification technology solution journey a few years ago we understood a key fact that is often overlooked and frequently not factored into the discussion and analysis of platforms designed to address the complexities of today’s patient ID environment. That simple fact is that the digitization of the industry has broke down traditional barriers of where and when a patient can either receive care along the continuum or access protected health information (PHI). Patients seeking care or data access no longer see brick and mortar healthcare facilities as the first and only place where they can consume healthcare.

The dawn of patient portals, telemedicine, connected health apps, and other virtual environments has fundamentally altered healthcare consumption by shifting care from traditional environments to virtual ones. For many patients, the first thought when they seek care or data access is to grab their phone, or login to their PC or tablet instead of hopping in their car and driving to the doctor’s office or local emergency department (ED). To us, innovation is bringing to market a patient identification solution that has the capability to truly address patient identification at ANY point along the care continuum, brick and mortar OR virtual environments.

RightPatient’s innovative spirit doesn’t stop there. We also define patient identification “innovation” by these additional solution attributes and milestones in our company’s history:

The RightPatient team was recently honored to be named a finalist in the CHIME National Patient ID Challenge. This is a true testament to the viability of our biometric patient identification solution and it should be noted that RightPatient was the only entry submitted from an individual/vendor who currently has customers actively using the technology in the healthcare market.
We officially launched the RightPatient Smart App during this year’s HIMSS show, which turns any smartphone or tablet into a powerful recognition device. The RightPatient Smart App uses augmented reality and deep learning to identify patients, can quickly and easily identify unconscious patients, allows clinicians to verify a patient’s identity bedside prior to medical procedures, and has the potential to drastically improve patient safety and reduce the risk of adverse events.
We built the RightPatient platform to enable healthcare organizations to capture a high resolution image of the patient during the enrollment and identification process. This photo is immediately linked to the patient’s unique medical record and subsequently stored in our cloud environment, following them wherever they go within the care continuum. The photo allows healthcare organizations to verify a patient’s identity in virtual environments (e.g. telemedicine, patient portals) outside of brick and mortar settings. After all, the value of any patient identification technology rests in its ability to accurately ID a patient, no matter where they are. Patient photos also help to humanize health IT by putting a face to a name. Many of our existing customers have commented that the patient’s photo helps them to personalize their approach and make patients feel safer and more comfortable.
The RightPatient patient identification solution uses photo biometrics to identify patients, a non-contact, hygienic form of biometrics that supports hospital infection control policies. Considering the increased attention on managing infection control in healthcare by keeping hands clean, we understood that patient ID innovation meant offering a solution to providers where a patient does not have to make physical contact with a biometric hardware device to avoid the spread of germs and illness.

We continue to innovate and evolve parallel to the rising challenges of establishing accurate patient ID in healthcare. For us, understanding the true meaning of patient ID innovation means designing and building a solution that not only address today’s obstacles and complexities, but has the flexibility to adapt to the challenges of tomorrow.

For a free, no obligation demo of the RightPatient patient identification solution, please contact us.

Michael Trader is President and Co-Founder of RightPatient®. Michael is responsible for overseeing business development and marketing activities, government outreach, and for providing senior leadership on business and policy issues.

4 Ways Tech Has Changed How Healthcare Providers Handle Patient ID Protocols

October 12, 2016/7151 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, Guest Blog Posts, Health Care, Patient Identification, Patient Matching, Patient Safety /by John Trader

The following post on patient ID in healthcare was submitted by Anica Oaks.

Methods of patient identification are critical to matching patients with their intended treatment in busy healthcare facilities. The failure to accomplish this has led to some serious consequences for patients and providers alike, in the form of unnecessary surgeries and wrong patient amputations resulting in a marked rise of lawsuits and malpractice insurance costs. Here are some technical solutions that healthcare professionals are looking at to help solve this problem.

Learn more about patient ID technologies and their impact on patient safety in healthcare.

1. Barcodes
Barcodes offer a convenient and cost-effective approach to establishing patient identity. New patients are entered into the system and issued a bar-coded ID bracelet which can be read by scanners at various locations during treatment, and automatically checked against patient databases. The same barcode can be printed on other documentation to be sure there is a match between the ID bracelet and any medications, test results, or scheduled treatments.

2. RFID Chips
Radio Frequency ID (RFID) chips emitting a unique signal are being touted as a better alternative to barcodes. These can be embedded in wristbands, hospital beds, or patient ID badges. Sensors reading this signal can generate the matching patient records on electronic devices. One advantage over barcodes is that chips can be read from a greater distance; sensors placed throughout the facility can also monitor patient movements for safety and security. RFID chips are also harder to duplicate. For this reason they are advocated by the FDA.

3. Staff Training
Identifying patients and administering ID protocols both upon admission and before receiving treatment typically falls to the nursing staff. Today’s nurses must be technically as well as medically trained to be effective in using the various patient ID technologies. A modern ADN to MSN online program (Associate Degree in Nursing to Master of Science in Nursing) better prepares nurses to understand and apply the technologies in use.

4. Biometrics
Using biometric devices is a fairly new but effective means of positive patient identification. Patient ID in healthcare now offers biometric devices that read iris patterns or even facial structure and are then matched against existing patient data to easily confirm identities. Barcodes or RFIDs leave room for error. A biometric characteristic, however, has only one possible match. Though these systems are more expensive to implement, their reliability and ease of use may be a wise investment.

Healthcare facilities today are faced with the need for stricter standards of patient identification. This is not just to safeguard patient health and professional integrity, but to guard against fraudulent use of ID to obtain drugs or free medical treatment. Today’s technology seems to finally be up to the challenge.

Anica is a professional content and copywriter who graduated from the University of San Francisco. She loves dogs, the ocean, and anything outdoor-related. She was raised in a big family, so she’s used to putting things to a vote. Also, cartwheels are her specialty. You can connect with Anica here.

Healthcare Scene Blab Tackles Patient Matching and Patient Identification

January 25, 2016/5824 views / 0 Comments/in BLOG, Health Care, Patient Identification, Patient Matching /by John Trader

Healthcare Scene’s John Lynn hosts a blab conversation on the topic of patient matching in healthcare with Michael Trader and Beth Just.

Our President Michael Trader was grateful for opportunity to discuss patient matching and patient identification in healthcare with Beth Just from Just Associates during John Lynn’s blab session earlier today. The discussion covered a wide range of topics including:

— How big is the patient identification problem in healthcare?
— The continuing problem of duplicate medical records in healthcare and strategies to improve and sustain patient data integrity
— Describing the availability and measuring the success of existing patient identification solutions in healthcare
— Would a national patient identifier help or would the existing challenges still apply?
— Why can’t the current solutions get to 100% patient matching?
— How does the CHIME $1 million National Patient ID Challenge work?Is this challenge achievable?

What materialized was an excellent discussion on patient identification in healthcare with both Michael and Beth offering intelligent insight on the problems that exist, solutions built to address the problems, and what it truly means to achieve 100% patient ID accuracy. Take a moment to watch the blab session here:

Special thanks to John Lynn and Healthcare Scene for hosting the discussion!

What are your top concerns surrounding the issue of achieving 100% patient matching in healthcare? Please share them with us in the comments below.