For a behavioral health provider, meeting with a patient in a one-on-one video conference is one of the best uses of the internet. Using telehealth, therapists can serve more patients, including those who might not otherwise have access to help.
Teleconferencing is even more valuable when the activity is tightly integrated into a behavioral health care provider’s electronic health record system. Integration automates important processes, saving time for everyone involved, and improves accuracy of the information that’s captured in a session. It also enables therapists to pay more attention to the patient than to the tools they use to document the session and follow-up care.
Telehealth, or virtual appointments, were critical during the COVID pandemic when going to the doctor was a health risk in itself. In 2019, approximately 39% of mental health providers offered telehealth; in 2022, approximately 88% did. Demand continues to be robust, fueled by increased anxiety and depression throughout society as well as the new habits of working, shopping, and banking from home.
Various levels of telehealth/EHR integration yield various benefits for providers. However, integration is inconsistent throughout the behavioral health EHR field. When systems aren’t integrated, telehealth providers are forced to manage multiple devices and software products to carry out their work. For example, therapists might use a tablet for the teleconference, an EHR on their desktop for record keeping, and a third app for scheduling. Data from one platform often needs to be copied, pasted, or typed into another, a process that invites transcription errors.
Integration Drives Outcomes
No EHR platform for behavioral health providers is more integrated with telehealth than AxiomEHR. Unlike competitors’ products, it intelligently captures therapy session transcripts with consenting patients (and most do consent), automatically triggering important workflows.
For example, AxiomEHR uses artificial intelligence to generate cleaned-up session notes, update medication information, drive diagnoses, populate treatment plans, optimize billing coding, and share vital information with authorized members of a multidisciplinary care team. Providers are always in control to accept or reject AI-fueled suggestions. All actions are secure, private, and HIPAA compliant.
Through AxiomEHR, telehealth appointments are as easy to schedule, track, and pay for as an in-person appointment, and can be completed in the same patient portal leveraging the same patient identification information. Telehealth is also folded into the revenue cycle management system just as any other service would be.
In AxiomEHR, telehealth software is embedded and ready to use. Neither patients nor therapists need to download any special software. The software manages bandwidth and ensures a stable connection to any reliable internet service.
Telehealth is an important service for delivering quality, value-based care. But unless it’s truly integrated with your EHR, you could be doing better for yourself and patients.
