Video Spotlight (transcript): Neuro Surgery Center, New England
My name’s Charles Kanaly. I’m a neurosurgeon here in the Fall River area. It’s the south coast of Massachusetts, so it’s basically kind of up- heading up towards the Cape. Um, so I’m in a solo private practice. We actually have about three PAs that help with our office though, help get through patients and everything. Um, and so we’re part of a hospital network, but we’re basically separate.
Yeah, so with Epion, I, uh, actually used to be part of a group practice, and then I got so busy in this area that I ended up going out on my own and making my own office. And so we started with a whole new electronic medical record. And while I was setting up the practice, I was looking for the best, most efficient ways to run the office and came across Epion. And this was- this was four or five years ago now. And, um, we, uh, were able to integrate that really well to kinda get our check-in process, get the patients into the office very quickly.
I kinda have a unique system in my office because, as a specialist, with surgery, it’s mostly getting people in, deciding whether or not they need surgery and getting them back out or getting them to the operating room. So we don’t have a whole lot of long-term chronic patients, it’s a lot of thorough put of new patients. And so something like this is critical to kinda get those people through the system and get them all checked in with everything you need.
Clinical Benefit quote: Well, it’s been integral. I mean, it actually helps with our wait times for one thing ’cause, um, we, uh, what- right when the people show up at the desk, we already have them doing something, so they don’t feel like they’re just waiting to be seen and not doing anything at all, sitting in the waiting room, they’re actually doing something and they’re an active part of their healthcare. Um, and so it makes them feel like they’re not just sitting around waiting until I’m-I’m ready to see them.
Um, but on top of it, it’s way more accurate. They’re actually able to visually see the information, make sure it’s correct. Um, and-and so it kind of makes them an active participant in the process, which has been very valuable. Um, also since my office is small, I am actually just integrated into another big, um, kinda like an urgent care, multi-physician building, so we don’t have a ton of room.
And so it’s nice having some of the check-in process done in the waiting room because we don’t have a ton of extra space to keep putting people through as it doubles the the amount of room needed for every patient if you’re bringing them into a check-in site and then bringing them into another room.
So it really works well with my office that we don’t need as much space because some of it is actually done in the waiting room beforehand. Because they’re doing some of the intake out front, they don’t have to be sitting in the patient room waiting as long and even taking up as long of time in the patient room, they’re doing a lot of it outside. Um, so in addition to them verifying it a little bit closer than just verbally, they’re actually seeing it. Um, it’s also cut down the time that they’re in the back rooms.
So when they’re in the rooms, they’re getting in and out faster, we can actually get through the patients faster. So it’s- it’s speeded up my office, and I think it’s made it more accurate. Onboarding / Implementation quote: So for on-boarding, for my office, it was actually very seamless. I mean, um, they offered to bring people in and help set it up and everything, but we really didn’t need that, um, and since I do have a fairly small tight knit office, it was only a couple of key people I needed to get this talk to, and then it could kinda spread out to everyone else.
So, as long as we got the couple main people involved, um, it-it really was very quick to implement. So, honestly they kinda showed us how to do it, I helped with my, um, EPI on person to make sure that everything was correct because we had an already templated review of systems and all the stuff that we wanted to ask, um, and even the categories for past medical and everything, we kinda reviewed all that and then they got it in the system and literally it was couple hours of me showing the front staff how to do it.
Um, I-I’ve been impressed with how easily people can pick it up because even when we’ve had staff turnovers and, um, there’s actually been some times when someone called out sick last minute and I had to have someone else rush over and cover check in. They’ve never seen this iPad before and yet they do it flawlessly. I mean we haven’t had any big issues with it at all. It’s worked really well.
Yeah, we really haven’t had major support issues. I mean every medical record, every now and then goes down and so something happens and, you know, we can’t even log into the whole medical record and so there’s always very minor tech things like that like once a year or something, but they’ve been very minor and they’ve actually fixed it very quickly. So, it hasn’t been a major disruption, we’ve never had to council in office because of an EPI on issue or anything.
Uh, but, um, the few things we’ve had is mostly not having to do with EPI on but more having to do with the iPad eventually iPads just their batteries die and so you have to get a replacement and things like that, but we haven’t had any major programming issues at all. Um, even replacing the iPads though we have more than one so we can make it work until the new one gets shipped, but it’s literally like an email or two and we got to do it here and it’s working fine.
So, it’s never been a big issue, it’s been very quick to fix any problem, they’re very easy to get, um, you know, in touch if there’s any issue. Yeah, I really enjoyed working with Epion since it is, uh, kind of a new [00:05:00] forefront with, um, you know, medical technology, it’s-it’s been fun to watch them grow and improve as time goes on. So, every year or so, you know, a new feature rolls out and even with, um, some beta testing, so there’s some features they’re experimenting with. And so, you know, my office has been running pretty well with the old system, but the new way sounds even better. So, they’ve been very, um, you know, receptive to putting out these new technologies and then literally just is like a software update it takes a couple minutes, it gets on the new iPad, and it has been working great.
Honestly, we haven’t had any major issues with any of that and it makes-it integrates even better with our medical records. So, it makes it a lot faster, less clicks and things like that, it’s worthwhile. Putting it actually has been a plus for my office, um, that I really like about it too, is actually the closing page, um, when you’re done with the check in, there’s actually a little, um, page that comes up saying, “Thank you, you’re completed.” But it also has a spot for little pictures and words about your practice or whatever you want to put there.
Um, you’ll be surprised how many patients have commented to me about that. They know a lot about my training, um, what I’ve done, what I’m doing where I am. And, um, it’s a great advertisement for your office ’cause, you know, you put little brochures out by your checking window, but a handful of people ever take those. But when they have the iPad in front of them, they all read the bio. Um, so it’s been a great advertisement for our office with that.
Well, in a word for me, I guess, I’d say Epion is efficient. Um, it’s made my office run very efficiently. I think it’s streamlined the check-in process tremendously. And even the company itself has been very quick to respond, it’s been very quick to adapt. I’d probably-probably say efficient. If someone asked me about Epion and was considering it for their office, I would definitely encourage them to give it a try. It’s worked extremely well. I’ve never had any regrets about it at all.
It’s very reliable, it’s honestly more reliable than staff that comes and goes. Um, it’s worked extremely well for, um, making the checking process very uniform. We know every question gets asked. Um, we know everything is gone through, um, and it’s efficient. And like-like I mentioned before, it actually lowers, um, people’s perception of waiting times because while they’re waiting, you’re actually actively involved doing something. So, it’s made the whole experience more pleasant for the patient and also much-much better for the office.