AnswerStat News and Info

In the Era of Accountable Care: What’s Your Healthcare Call Center IQ?

2012-02-07T20:00:02Z

That question is addressed by HealthLine Systems’ new call center IQ quiz. Whether or not your organization deploys an official ACO,

Is your call center positioned now for competitive advantage or competitive disadvantage?
What are your immediate opportunities to strengthen your call center’s role in supporting your organization’s Accountable Care priorities?
How can you improve your call center IQ?

You can take the quiz and have your score quickly, in less than five minutes.

The quiz addresses important opportunities for you in areas critical to your call center’s success including how to:

Streamline access to care,
Serve as physicians’ marketing partner,
Reduce redundant costs,
Deliver concierge experiences, and
Document the call center as an investment.

You’ll receive a letter grade score plus a written description of how your specific contact center is positioned in the era of accountable care. Check out your healthcare call center IQ at http://www.healthlinesystems.com/quiz.aspx.

HealthLine provides peerless information management solutions to maximize the quality and delivery of healthcare services through technological innovation.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

The Feb/Mar 2012 Issue of AnswerStat Magazine is Now Available

2012-02-06T16:31:36Z

The February/March 2012 issue of AnswerStat magazine, covering healthcare call centers, is now available.

You may access it with our digital magazine viewer to:

easily flip through the issue
print out select pages or the entire thing
forward it to a friend
search for specific text
add notes for later reference
view the table of contents
view a list of advertisers
plus all the article and ad links are active!

You may also read the articles or download a PDF file from our website.

Please welcome our new sponsor Ambs Call Center who made this paperless distribution of AnswerStat made possible..

To receive email notifications each time a new issue is posted, enter your email address in the "subscribe" field to the left. This will allow you to also be notified of other relevant information as well. Alternately, you might want to use our Atom or RSS news feeds or subscribe to this and our other related publications.

[AnswerStat magazine is proudly published by Peter DeHaan Publishing Inc and Peter DeHaan.]

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Pediatric Telephone Triage Conference: Answering the Call

2012-01-31T20:30:07Z

Pediatric Telephone Triage Conference: Answering the Call
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Sheraton Clayton Plaza Hotel St. Louis
Jointly sponsored by St. Louis Children's Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine

Health care professionals who provide telephone triage in pediatric and family practice office settings are invited to join national speakers for this continuing education event. Agenda items include:

Clinically Challenging Calls: What Would You Do? Barton Schmitt, MD
Pediatric Injuries: Looking Through the Caller's Eyes David Thompson, MD, CHC, FACEP
Nursing Principles of Telephone Triage Carol Rutenberg, RN-BC, C-TNP, MNSc

For more information: www.stlouischildrens.org/content/phonetriage2012.htm

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

RelayHealth Customer Conference: October 22-24, 2012

2012-01-19T15:10:00Z

October 22-24, 2012
RelayHealth Customer Conference
Scottsdale, AZ
For more information, email patty.maynard@relayhealth.com

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Startel Secure Messaging Announced

2012-01-18T19:01:52Z

Startel Corporation’s new secure messaging application stores protected health information (PHI) securely on mobile devices, encrypts PHI messages during transmission, and protects messages upon delivery. Distinguishing itself from many other applications, secure messaging also enables secure, peer-to-peer communication between smartphones. With the release of this new secure messaging system, health clinicians now have a secure and efficient means of communication – with comprehensive audit trails and reporting capabilities.

Fully compliant with HIPAA, HITECH, GLBA, and SOX, Startel Secure Messaging utilizes Secure Socket Layer (SSL) technology. Startel’s secure messaging application is currently available for iOS (Apple Mobile OS), Android (Google OS), and Blackberry (RIM OS). The application can be enabled in two easy steps:

1) Download from a Web-based application marketplace.
2) Enter a unique registration ID supplied by a sponsoring organization.

Says William Lane, president of Startel Corporation, "While the application itself is free, the sponsoring organization needs to subscribe to Startel's SMS Service or make other cost-effective arrangements with Startel. This way Startel is not placed between our customers and our customer’s clients."

For more information, contact Myrna Nunez at 800-782-7835 or sales@startel.com.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Read the January 2012 Issue of Medical Call Center News

2012-01-16T22:23:08Z

The January 2012 issue of Medical Call Center News is now available at www.medicalcallcenternews.com.

Medical Call Center News is an e-newsletter published by Peter DeHaan Publishing Inc, in conjunction with AnswerStat magazine. It is sponsored by Amcom Software.

Subscribe to receive Medical Call Center News via email.

Please tell you friends and coworkers about Medical Call Center News.

Thank you!

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Apple miSecureMessages App Enhanced

2012-01-16T21:58:19Z

The 1Call division of Amtelco announced that the miSecureMessages App for Apple devices has been updated and is available for download on the iTunes® store. The app sends encrypted messages to smartphones and mobile devices and allows for secure two-way communications, maintaining Protected Health Information (PHI). It saves time for clinicians and patients, helping organizations meet HIPAA and HITECH regulations, while also providing better patient care. With Apps available for the Apple iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch, as well as for Android and BlackBerry® devices, it is an ideal solution for replacing pagers.

A few of the new enhancements include giving users faster access to replying, forwarding, deleting, or completing a message or message thread. The forward button is also now available on the view message screen, saving time for users. In addition, phone numbers, email addresses, and street addresses now appear as clickable links in the message body, message subject, and the message thread pages, speeding response times.

In other news, 1Call will be attending the HIMSS12 and 2012 NAEO conferences. 1Call will have two booth locations at HIMSS12, which will be held February 20-24 in Las Vegas. Attendees can find 1Call’s complete call center solutions in HIMSS booth 13123 and can find out more about miSecureMessages encrypted two-way messaging and pager replacement solution in the HIMSS Mobile Health Knowledge Center, booth 12928, kiosk 16. HIMSS attendees are invited to take part in 1Call’s presentation on miSecureMessages in the Mobile Health Knowledge Center on Tuesday, February 21, from 4:15-5:00 pm.

The 2012 NAEO (National Amtelco Equipment Owners) annual conference is also being held in Las Vegas, February 19-22 at the Cosmopolitan Hotel. HIMSS attendees are invited to join 1Call at the NAEO conference for several opportunities, including the Amtelco-sponsored party, which will be held at the Cosmopolitan Hotel from 7:00 until 10:00 p.m. on Monday, February 20. HIMSS attendees can also participate in the 1Call seminar, which will be held at the Cosmopolitan Hotel from 12:30 until 4:00 pm on Wednesday, February 22. To reserve a spot at the NAEO sessions, contact call 800-225-6035 or email to info@1call.com.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Read the December 2011 Issue of Medical Call Center News

2011-12-19T21:48:22Z

The December 2011 issue of Medical Call Center News is now available at www.medicalcallcenternews.com.

Medical Call Center News is an e-newsletter that is sponsored by Amcom Software and published by Peter DeHaan Publishing Inc, in conjunction with AnswerStat magazine.

Subscribe to receive Medical Call Center News via email.

Please tell you friends and coworkers about Medical Call Center News.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

AAACN 2012 Conference: May 2-May 5, 2012

2011-12-12T18:55:10Z

The American Academy of Ambulatory Care Nursing (AAACN) 37th Annual Conference, May 2-5, 2012, will be held at the Hilton in the Walt Disney World Resort® in Lake Buena Vista, FL. The conference’s keynote address, “Livin’, Laughin’, and Learnin’… Through the Years,” will be delivered by Barbee Bancroft, MSN, RN, PNP. Bancroft will explore the new nursing environment and how nurses can stay healthy while balancing everyone else’s lives. Additional sessions on how health care reform will affect the specialty are woven throughout the conference program.

Participants will attend education sessions presented by industry experts, enhance their ambulatory and telehealth nursing knowledge, strengthen their leadership skills, earn continuing nursing education (CNE) contact hours, view posters, visit the Exhibit Hall, and network with colleagues. Participants may also register for the Telehealth Nursing Practice Core Course (TNPCC) and the Ambulatory Care Nursing Certification Review Course.

Each year, the AAACN conference attracts a broad range of health care providers who work in ambulatory care settings, including military and telehealth. Attendees include RNs who are administrators, directors, managers, educators, care coordinators, and clinicians.

May 2-May 5, 2012
AAACN 2012
American Academy of Ambulatory Care Nursing Annual Conference
Hilton Walt Disney World, Orlando, FL
Special telehealth track offered
For more information, visit www.aaacn.org/conference or call 800-262-6877

Acqueon Releases AiQ 4.0

2011-12-12T17:02:09Z

Acqueon Technologies announced the release of AiQ 4.0, which offers new social media and mobile application features to improve the customer experience and an improved SIP engine to give contact centers greater support for telephony and web mashups. AiQ enables organizations to offer numerous communication channels in their contact centers including, social media, texting, and chat along with voice and email. A universal work assignment engine as opposed to the traditional skill-based routing used in legacy contact centers enables enterprises to service and route their customer interactions to the right resources based the context of their current and past interaction history. This version reduces the time callers need to wait to talk to an agent and enables them to continue an interaction with the same agent even if it was unexpectedly interrupted. Supervisor desktop applications join data reporting in a growing list of applications accessible via a range of mobile devices for supervisors outside of the traditional call center.

Acqueon provides solutions to the healthcare field with applications such as prescription refill, telemarketing to prospective clients, and collections, as well as helping with disease management and control emergency room visits and costs.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

The Dec 2011/Jan 2012 Issue of AnswerStat Magazine is Now Available

2011-12-08T20:06:58Z

The December 2011/January 2012 issue of AnswerStat magazine, covering healthcare call centers, is now available.

You may access it with our digital magazine viewer to:

easily flip through the issue
print out select pages or the entire thing
forward it to a friend
search for specific text
add notes for later reference
view the table of contents
view a list of advertisers
plus all the article and ad links are active!

Or you may download a PDF file of the issue or read the articles online.

The paperless distribution of AnswerStat is made possible by Amcom Software.

To receive email notifications each time a new issue is posted, enter your email address in the "subscribe" field to the left. This will allow you to also be notified of other relevant information as well. Alternately, you might want to use our Atom or RSS news feeds or subscribe to this and other related publications.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Paging Carrier Association Adopts New Name

2011-11-29T18:50:40Z

The American Association of Paging Carriers has changed its name to the Critical Messaging Association (CMA). Founded in 2002, the association is the only U.S. trade group for companies that provide paging and critical messaging products and services. Emergency healthcare professionals, first responders and public safety personnel – who require reliable, fast communications during a crisis or disaster – have been the core critical messaging user since paging was first introduced in the early 1960s.

“Our name change reflects the continued importance of the critical messaging segment within the overall communications industry, as well the broad array of products and technologies, in addition to paging, that now support the delivery of time-sensitive and critical messages,” said Critical Messaging Association president J. Roy Pottle. “We invite anyone with a role in this dynamic industry to consider the benefits of being a member.”

CMA has launched a new Web site in conjunction with the name change, www.criticalmessagingassociation.org and will hold its 2012 Global Critical Messaging Convention March 27-29 in Austin, Texas.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

AAACN Releases 5th Edition of Telehealth Standards

2011-11-28T20:18:53Z

The American Academy of Ambulatory Care Nursing (AAACN) released the newly titled Scope and Standards of Practice for Professional Telehealth Nursing. The fifth edition provides scope and practice guidance specific to the ambulatory subspecialty of Telehealth. The standards promote effective clinical and administrative management of the increasingly complex telehealth nursing roles and responsibilities in a changing health care environment. Sixteen standards are included along with competencies for telehealth registered nurses, nurse executives, administrators, and managers. The standards reflect current professional norms, practices, and expectations.

The publication can be used as a tool to advance ambulatory care professional nursing practice, patient health, and the performance outcomes of telehealth institutions. This resource is ideal for writing policies, procedures, and job descriptions; orienting staff; planning for Joint Commission surveys; and increasing the quality and safety of patient care. You can also use the “standards” to prepare for the ambulatory care nursing certification exam, which contains questions on telehealth nursing and is the recommended exam to validate telehealth nursing knowledge. It costs $44 and can be ordered at www.aaacn.org/store.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Office Ally Relocates to San Antonio

2011-11-22T17:23:27Z

Office Ally is relocating its corporate office to San Antonio, Texas, where it will also open a customer call center and training facility to accommodate the company’s record-setting growth; it is currently located in Vancouver, Washington. Office Ally offers healthcare providers a suite of revenue-cycle management services including a practice management system, electronic health records, clearinghouse, billing service, and patient portal.

"A year ago we were taking 850 calls a day and now that number has grown to 1,800," said president and CEO Brian O'Neill. "The new 17,000-square-foot call center will allow us to better accommodate this growth while also providing a 60-seat space for onsite training for local providers who want to avail themselves of that service." To handle this volume, O'Neill says that his company will add 100 customer service representatives, trainers and technicians upon opening in San Antonio; and he anticipates growing by an additional 150 employees after six months.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Ambs Call Center Earns 2011 CAM-X Award of Excellence

2011-11-22T17:19:32Z

Ambs Call Center has been honored with the 2011 Award of Excellence for the second consecutive year. The award is presented annually by the Canadian Call Management Association (CAM-X), an industry trade association for providers of call center services. Independent judges are contracted by CAM-X to evaluate call centers throughout North America over a six-month period. The criteria for scoring include courtesy, response time, accuracy, and overall service to their clients.

"Participation in the CAM-X Award of Excellence program helps make for a great first impression for all callers, even when contact is made after regular business hours. The CAM-X Awards of Excellence program raises the bar for the best customer service experience possible. We congratulate Ambs Call Center for their achievements," said CAM-X president Tom Sheridan.

Ambs Call Center provides full service inbound, outbound, and e-bound contact center and fulfillment solutions, processing over 10 million contacts annually. Ambs Call Center was presented with the award at the CAM-X 47th Annual Convention and Trade Show held at the Hyatt Regency, Montreal, QC.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

1Call’s Pro Show Now Available as a Hosted Solution

2011-11-18T21:48:52Z

Healthcare organizations must constantly contend with patients who miss their scheduled appointments without notifying the physician’s office. These “no show” appointments cost thousands of dollars in wasted resources and staff time. 1Call’s Pro Show automated appointment reminder helps healthcare organizations be proactive by reminding patients in advance, saving time and money and increasing staff productivity.

Pro Show has been available as an on-site solution for several years, and is now available as a hosted solution. Pro Show reminds patients via home phone, mobile phone, email, and text messages. Reminders can be sent instantly or scheduled. Pro Show can also remind physicians and staff about upcoming meetings, classes, and other events.

Currently, healthcare organizations are sending thousands of automated appointment reminders each month, resulting in a significant reduction of patient “no shows.” This has also shortened waiting lists, since rescheduling appointments is no longer necessary. 1Call president Tom Curtin said, “The automated Pro Show significantly increases staff productivity, as staff members no longer need to manually call patients to remind them about upcoming appointments.”

In other news, 1Call’s miSecureMessages, which sends encrypted messages to smartphones and mobile devices, tracks messages sent from operators and messages sent from device to device. A complete audit trail shows the message, when it was sent, when the message was read, what the reply was, and when the reply was sent. This information gives healthcare organizations complete and detailed records for maintaining historical accuracy. The reports are accessible only by an administrator and can now be exported to Microsoft® Excel® or to Adobe® PDF formats.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Seminar: Telephone Triage as Professional Nursing Practice: Improve Quality & Reduce Risk

2011-11-17T20:37:40Z

Telephone Triage Consulting Presents:
Telephone Triage as Professional Nursing Practice: Improve Quality & Reduce Risk

February 6-7, 2012
Holiday Inn Atlanta Perimeter, Atlanta, GA

February 9-10, 2012
Embassy Suites Birmingham, Birmingham, AL

Read the November 2011 Issue of Medical Call Center News

2011-11-15T14:06:00Z

The November 2011 issue of Medical Call Center News is now available at www.medicalcallcenternews.com.

Medical Call Center News is an e-newsletter that is sponsored by Amcom Software and published by Peter DeHaan Publishing Inc, in conjunction with AnswerStat magazine.

Subscribe to receive Medical Call Center News via email.

Please tell you friends and coworkers about Medical Call Center News.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

OnviSource Introduces Excella Plus

2011-11-08T21:17:30Z

OnviSource announced Excella Plus, automated Quality Assurance (QA) and call analytics. Excella Plus integrates with OnviSource’s Explora speech analytics to deliver automated mass monitoring and analysis of recorded interactions. This allows automated monitoring and analysis of every call without having to add QA personnel. Analytics-based QA uses the automation of speech analytics to analyze 100% of recordings to identify those recordings that require a more in depth analysis for compliance, discovery, and quality management.

Excella Plus uses call recording intelligence to capitalize on hidden opportunities and insights, identify liabilities, and target training efforts. It can provide a comprehensive QA program and share business intelligence, making it economical to provide this as value-added service. Excella Plus products are integrated with the OnviCenter suite of workforce optimization and automation software products.

OnviSource offers a special service program to assist customers with implementation, deployment, and ROI recognition, including ROI analysis, application analysis, project planning, customization, pilot programs, and hands-on training, as well as, business continuity and assurance measures.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.

Startel Now Employee-Owned

2011-11-08T20:43:46Z

William Lane, CEO and president of Startel Corporation, announced that Bill Robertshaw has sold the company, which will be an employee-owned entity backed by private investor, Brian W. Stewart. Bill Lane and the Startel team will remain in place and the day-to-day operations of the company will not be effected.

“It was in the best interest of Startel Corporation, its employees and especially its customers to sell the company at this time. Bill Lane has done a superb job of leading Startel out of its post Comverse years and I am confident that Startel, with the support of Mr. Stewart, will be able to progress to the next phase in its corporate evolution,” said Robertshaw.

“Mr. Robertshaw, a financial genius, was the perfect advisor for the season of Startel where he helped guide us in focusing on becoming an ever more profitable company. He has always had the best interest of Startel and its customers at heart and selling the company is no exception,” said Lane.
Brian Stewart is a serial entrepreneur and has founded and built over 18 start-up businesses during his career.

For more information, contact Sheryl Denny at 949-863-8774 or sheryl.denny@startel.com.

Copyright 2008-2012, Peter DeHaan and Peter DeHaan Publishing, Inc.