6. Patient-Specific Educational Resources

This lesson will demonstrate the steps necessary to meet the Meaningful Use requirement for Patient-Specific Educational Resources.

NOTE: The Handout function can be automated so that handouts are included and can be printed quickly and seamlessly.

Version:

SOAPware 2011 or later must be used.

Note: To determine the version of SOAPware being used, Click on Help > About SOAPware. This will open a window which will show the version and build of SOAPware currently in use.

Dashboard:

This requirement will be tracked via the Meaningful Use Dashboard.

Measure Criteria

Objective: Use certified EHR technology to identify patient-specific education resources and provide those resources to the patient if appropriate.

Measure: More than 10 percent of all unique patients seen by the EP are provided patient-specific education resources.

For more detailed information on this measure, please Click on the "Reference" link below. This CMS documentation includes information on exclusions, attestation requirements, a definition of terms and important additional information.

CLICK TO VIEW THE CMS DOCUMENTATION ON THIS MEASURE:

Reference: CMS: Patient-Specific Educational Resources

Measure Calculation

Denominator: The number of unique patients that have been seen and have a face-to-face encounter during the reporting period.

Note: The denominator is unique patients rather than unique patient visits during the reporting period. Therefore, if a patient is seen three times in the reporting period, you only have to fulfill the rule once for that patient, rather than at all 3 encounters. However, the patient must have at least one face-to-face encounter during the reporting period in order to fulfill the rule.

Numerator: The number of patients in the denominator who are provided patient-specfic education resources (handouts) by using the appropriate workflow within SOAPware.  The eligible provider will provide the handout to the patient and will need to make sure to use the automatic handout feature (Ctrl +H) in the encounter Plan field.

Threshold: The resulting percentage must be more than 10%.

* Scoring is individual, provider-based and not practice-wide.

 

Patient Education and the MU Dashboard

Patient Education and the MU Dashboard

Patient education materials are tracked in the Meaningful Use Dashboard.

In order for the patient's handouts to be counted on the provider's dashboard, you will have to open the Patient's MU Dashboard and click on "Patient Education" . When you do this, it inserts the Handouts into the SOAPnote and it puts a green check mark on the Patient's MU Dashboard next to Patient Education. If you have already selected handouts or have them set to select automatically, the Patient Education item in the Patient MU Dashboard will recognize the handouts selected and place a green check mark next to Patient Education.

Using SOAPware Handouts

Using SOAPware Handouts

With the Handouts function, keywords can be used in order to match diagnosis and medication information from a SOAPnote encounter to Handouts. See: Add Handouts for an introduction to this function.

During a patient visit, this function can Select Handouts Automatically.

Document Designs can be created to automatically print any handouts associated with a SOAPnote encounter when that design is printed. For instance, when a SOAPnote is printed to give the patient, any handout selected during the visit can also be printed automatically. See: Print Handouts Automatically when other Documents are Printed.

 

Methods for Distributing Handouts to Patients

The Handouts selected can be printed or faxed using Document Designer, or emailed using the Docu-portal. Printing is recommended by SOAPware for the Stage 1 Meaningful Use requirements.

MU Patient Dashboard

MU Patient Dashboard

This measure is tracked in the MU Patient Dashboard under "Patient Education". The Patient Dashboard can be viewed by selecting View > MU Patient Dashboard.

Once Handouts have been entered into the Plan field for the active SOAPnote the MU Patient Dashboard icon will change to a green check mark.

*Note: The MU Patient Dashboard will be grayed out if there are no SOAPnote encounters. It will also remain grayed out if the active SOAPnote encounter is signed off or if the SOAPnote encounter is a Non Face-to-Face encounter.

Meaningful Use Dashboard

Meaningful Use Dashboard

This measure is tracked in the Meaningful Use Dashboard under "Patient Education". The Meaningful Use Dashboard can be accessed by selecting SOAPware > Meaningful Use Dashboard.

The Meaningful Use Dashboard will display the Numerator, Denominator and percentage for this measure, as well as, graph the trend for the dates selected.  Please see the following link for instructions on using the Meaningful Use Dashboard: Meaningful Use Dashboard.

*Note: The dashboard icon will display a gray X if the threshold for this measure has not been met for the selected reporting period. The icon will change to a green check mark once the threshold for the meaningful use measure has been met.