The minds of healthcare providers operate much like your typical software computing system. In one sense, the average person only understands the various outputs of information provided and the front-end design of the system. However, what we don’t see in those systems and providers alike are the hundreds of thousands of decision points being processed internally. From managing numerous critical patients at a time, running through a long list of differential diagnoses for the patient in front of them, tracking lab results for the patients that have been seen, and being ready to take on the next person being brought in at any point in time, the average workday of a provider can feel overburdened and distracted from what’s most important: providing quality care.
Thankfully, with their inclusion in the healthcare field, medical scribes are not only able to provide efficient and effective charting, but they’re also capable of reducing the stressors and burdens of the provider by acting as an extension of their unnecessarily crowded minds.
The role of a medical scribe extends much further than just providing real-time documentation services. Medical scribes can be seen as the “Swiss Army Knife” of the healthcare field, as they provide numerous services tailored to organizational needs.
But the question remains: Is your provider utilizing medical scribes to their most effective standard? Here are 3 tips to ensure you’re maximizing every opportunity while working alongside a medical scribe.
3 Tips for Healthcare Providers Utilizing Scribes
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More than just documenting
Understanding the scope of services a medical scribe offers can greatly alleviate some initial pain-points for your provider’s day-to-day operations. Medical scribes can offer transcription services to assist with translating voice recorded notes into electronic documents, assist with basic triage procedures, monitor patient flow, update labs and reports, and even provide the occasional check-in to confirm if the patient has moved from one area of the clinic to the next.
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Personalize your services
Often, we‘ll see physicians spending time on documents trying to tailor it to their own style of writing and speaking. Sometimes a physician will ask a single question and get numerous long answers in return. Medical scribes are here to assist with capturing your patient interactions fully. It’s important to develop an initial dialogue with your medical scribe to ensure the provider’s thought process is aligned with the medical scribe. Providing insight on what exactly you’re looking for in a particular case, or simply reviewing previous documents, can facilitate the limitation of rework and revisions to the medical document.
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Create a checklist that your scribe can follow throughout the day
Developing a checklist to cross off numerous clerical tasks, managing multiple aspects of the EHR, and any other miscellaneous items can greatly increase the level of autonomy for healthcare providers.
Providers are often riddled with cumbersome tasks that take away from patient-facing interactions. In fact, according to a recent PubMed journal:
“Most studies suggest that physicians find the loss of autonomy at work, decreased control over the work environment, inefficient use of time due to administrative requirements, and loss of support from colleagues to be the central factors. A national survey conducted among physicians across all specialties in 2014 found that physicians who used electronic health records (EHRs) and computerized physician order entry (CPOE) were less satisfied with the time spent on clerical work and were at increased risk of professional exhaustion.”
Following the three tips mentioned above can greatly augment healthcare providers’ experience while working with a medical scribe. This assistance improves efficiency, reduces clerical burdens, and enhances the accuracy of medical records, ultimately leading to increased provider productivity and better patient interactions.