Connecticut Retina Consultants has been serving the New Haven area since 1990. The five doctor, four location retina practice specializes in medical and surgical retinal diseases, including macular degeneration, retinal detachment and diabetic retinopathy, among others. To accommodate the practice’s growth, Connecticut Retina Consultants implemented a generic EMR, hoping it would take the practice to new levels of productivity. After four years, however, Connecticut Retina Consultants found itself shopping for a new EMR solution and eventually upgraded to Nextech’s cloud-based and ophthalmology specific IntelleChart.
Mary Baglin
Office Administrator
After making the switch to IntelleChart, Mary Baglin and the rest of the staff saw the benefits of implementing an ophthalmology specific solution.
“We just could not customize the generic templates of our prior solution to what we needed. The doctors couldn’t work and couldn’t get anything in the EMR,” Baglin explained. “We stayed on paper charts during the whole experience of being on the generic EMR because the doctors didn’t trust it … they refused to use the EMR because it was so cumbersome.”
“We love the template setup in IntelleChart,” Baglin added. “We can individualize each of the doctors within the practice, so we have five templates for five doctors, and we can add and subtract things as needed. Dr. Montzka just understood what ophthalmologists needed in their practices.”
Software upgrades also became a hassle for Connecticut Retina Consultants in regard to their template setup and customizations. Following each upgrade, the practice would find itself not only paying extra money, but also wasting time redoing their customizations that were erased during the upgrade.
“Every single time our first EMR upgraded, there was always a cost. They nickeled and dimed you to death. Every upgrade it seemed like we had to go back in and reset. The upgrades would throw everything off,” Baglin said.
Fortunately for the doctors and staff, those customizations issues are no more. IntelleChart’s easy-to-use Adaptive Template technology creates a unique and specific patient form on the go, allowing for greater efficiency as non-relevant selections are eliminated based off the patient’s condition. Now, Connecticut Retina Consultants can adjust templates however they want without fear of losing them during an upgrade. Thanks to the cloud-based software, upgrades are simple and painless as IntelleChart automatically upgrades to the newest version available.
“We’ve had minimal problems, if any,” Baglin said about IntelleChart’s upgrades. “None of the upgrades have affected any of our templates, so it’s just easier to get around and much clearer.”
Often times, an EHR’s usability can have a trickle-down effect on the entire practice. For doctors, the more time spent working through the EMR, would mean less time they could spend on the patient as they were so busy trying to enter data which was very tedious and time consuming causing the practice to see fewer patients than they could see even when on paper.
At Connecticut Retina Consultants, Dr. Larrison, who was the lone doctor at the practice utilizing the clinic’s generic EMR solution, saw approximately 20 patients per day with the software. After switching to IntelleChart, Dr. Larrison’s patient volume received a significant bump – an 80 percent increase.
“Oh, we’re much more efficient on IntelleChart,” Baglin said. “We’ve increased our patient flows with Dr. Larrison quite a bit. He’s seeing around 36 patients per day and we’ve been able to do that because of having an EMR system like IntelleChart.”
To make matters worse for the practice, the generic vendor’s support left Baglin and other staff members feeling unimportant to the generic EMR solution. Often waiting several days before getting any kind of resolution to an issue, the long delays hindered the practice’s day-to-day operations. Now with IntelleChart, it’s a completely different story for Connecticut Retina Consultants.
“The turnaround time is minimal. I’ve had an answer within a day of asking them to change something,” Baglin said. “The support is phenomenal. They pay attention to what the doctors are requesting and what their needs are.”
“Going from ‘customer no service’ to [IntelleChart] with customer support that is wonderful has made our lives easier.”
The benefits gained as a result of implementing the EMR have made a significant impact as well.
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