What’s New November 2005

General
  		• Please forward this newsletter by email or paper to everyone in your office, and to your colleagues outside the office, and please notify us of emails that you wish added to the list.
  		• Along with all the changes this month, we have added one novel new feature that allows patients to enter their demographic data on a terminal in the waiting room.
  		• Thanks again for your continuing suggestions, which are the source of many of our new features and fixes, referrals to your colleagues and your great testimonials.

    EMR
  		• The Notes Screen now has 2 panes with a moveable splitter, so that the user can work with 2 notes at one time. The position of the splitter can be changed with the mouse, but a default position can be set at Tools| User Settings. To select a note first click on the space where you want to view the note and then select it on the List. Do not select the same note in both and expect to edit as one will lock the other.
  		• Another feature that has been added is a Summary Note. This will be automatically created for each patient and will be opened initially in the upper note space with a blue background. It will not be locked and is intended as a summary of your key points, scores and reminders over the course of the patient's treatment, that would otherwise be buried in the detailed notes. It will appear at the top of the list.

    Appointments Screen
  		• The Appointments Menu items on the popup list have been tightened up to ensure that only the appropriate menu items are shown and to prevent initiating an action without first left-clicking on the appointment calendar to select the date and time. This should eliminate any unexpected results from having the wrong record selected or no record selected.
  		• To move an appointment, use the Cut and Paste options on the popup menu. The Move item has been removed.
  		• A Find Next Open Time item added to the popup menu, that does the same as the Binocular Button used to do.
  		• A second dialog has been added and the question inverted when deleting an appointment in a repeat sequence, in order to eliminate accidental deletions.
  		• A Button has been added to the Book Appointment Form to find the next appointment just as the Binocular Button used to do.
  		• Types of reminders were added to the Book Appointments Form, although the actual reminder process has not been implemented in all cases. The patients with reminders for the next business day can be imported into the Tasks Screen and patients contacted from there using the popup menu item Get Appointment Reminders for..
  		• Letter reminders can be created from the Task Manager using the Print/Send Reminders | Letter popup menu item. These letters can be customized in 2 ways:
  • Cancellation notice set as hours at the Customization Provider Screen or no notice.
  • Charge for missed appointments set at the Customization Provider Screen or no mention of a charge.
  		• The patients date of birth has been added to the list of patients printed from the Printing | Names in Title Box | with addresses and Phone numbers. This is useful information when writing prescriptions outside the office for those users of TheraManager who do not use the PDA module. The PDA module not only keeps your appointments, contacts and patients contact info, but it keeps the current prescriptions, patients pharmacy phone number and allows you to update them for syncing back into your Theramanager database.
  		• When using the super privacy mode, ie when one provider cannot see the names of the other patients, a problem arose when 2 providers need to book appointments with the same patient. A new freature was added to address this. Two principal providers may be assigned at the Patients/Clients Screen. The patients name will then appear on both the providers lists. If you select a second provider and then wish to change back to only one, just select the same initials in both boxes.

    Accounting
  		• Two new transaction categories have been added. One is used when posting a deferred cpt, and the other is for posting an insured partial payment. These help to keep track of the receivables at the Transactions Screen.
  		• The partial payments process at the Payments | Insurance Screen has been further enhanced and automatically moves the cpt record to the next appropriate status after posting the partial payment.
  		• A requirement for successfully submitting Medicare HCFA-1500 claims in MA, namely not filling Boxes 4, 7 and 11, has been added.
  		• A bug that briefly crept into an update and caused deferred cpt records not to be advanced to the next status after an insurance payment was fixed as soon as we heard about it. Any "stuck" records or your delinquent "HCFA" records can be viewed at View | CPT Records | Delinquent on the system menu.
  		• There has been a stealth feature in the program for some time, that allowed users to predate the post-date. This is accessed via the Binocular Button. This has become a very popular feature but had the unexpected consequence that bills with predated records could sometimes print with the prior or final balance taken from the incorrect record. This has been fixed. The option to change the postdate has now been made more obvious. Remember that once changed it will not return to the current date until reset or you logout.
  		• Because of the need to reindex the billing records, on doing the update there will be a reminder to go to the Batch Printing Screen after login and click the Check Balances Button. This could take many minutes to an hour or more but must be done prior to printing any patient bills.

    Prescriptions
  		• We are working with a printer of prescription blanks in CA to standardize a format that meets the new CA state requirements. Please contact us for ordering information for blanks that work with TheraManager.
  		• A new Serial# column was added to grid on the Prescription Screen, where you can enter the serial number of your script in those case where the serial number is preprinted on the script.

    Patients Self-Entry
  		• Patients can now enter their demographic and billing information on a terminal in the waiting room. Of course only the one patient name is visible and available to the patient and the patient uses a special password. We would like to find out the interest in this feature and its extension to testing, so please contact us if you wish to know how to take advantage of it. At this point the interface is the same one that is currently presented to users of TheraManager, but if there is sufficient demand, we expect to make the interface more patient friendly.
    TheraManager is generally exceptionally smart, easy-to-use and accurate, but if you find it to be dumb, difficult, devious or defective in any area, or you have ideas for features, or need training please contact support@theramanager.com or call 908-273-9410.
    Earlier newsletters are on the website for reference.
    If you have never downloaded TheraManager, go to our website and download the Trial that will include all these new features, or call 800-913-4294, if your original trial has expired.
    Our customers continue to convert from many other programs and we can make the switch easy for you with an import of your existing patient data.