Join Product Training, Knowledge & Deployment Leader Suzi Eley and Commercial Partnership Specialist Will Durnford in the first episode of the Best Practice Software Podcast.
In this episode, Suzi and Will cover topics raised during the Electronic Prescribing masterclass, such as queries surrounding implementation and rollout, how the token system works, how to find a participating pharmacy, and associated privacy concerns.
Listen to the podcast in browser below.
Note: Since the time of recording all states and territories have approved the use of Electronic Prescriptions. eScripts are now a legal form of prescription across Australia.
A core part of healthcare in Australia today is communication between healthcare providers. However many of these sensitive communications are taking place via unsecure channels, or through channels that aren’t compatible, leading to a breakdown of communication, poor health outcomes and inefficiencies.
To solve this challenge, a national initiative has been introduced to transform the way health information is exchanged in Australia. A key goal of the initiative is to equip healthcare providers with the ability to communicate with other professionals utilising secure messaging via their integrated practice management system. This will result in reduced dependency on unsecure channels such as paper-based correspondence, fax machine or post.
Here’s what you need to know about secure messaging – what it is, why it’s important, how it will impact practices and the timeline for implementation.
What is Secure Messaging?
Secure messaging enables the encrypted electronic exchange of patient healthcare information between healthcare providers. Point-to-point delivery of messages such as discharge summaries, referrals, requests and results represent the typical use case.
The electronic message is encrypted by the sender and decrypted by the receiver and therefore cannot be read if intercepted in transit.
Software vendors and their solutions, built to facilitate secure message delivery, are well established in Australasia, some with over 25 years in the market.
It’s fair to say that the majority of practices have had some exposure to secure message service providers (eg, Telstra Health Argus, Healthlink, Medical Objects and ReferralNet) and may even have more than one service enabled.
Why Does Secure Messaging Matter?
In a shared care environment, where it is necessary to exchange healthcare information, secure messaging ensures that the highest level of security and privacy is maintained. Protecting a patient’s sensitive, healthcare information and in alignment with the Privacy Act 1988. In addition, the benefits of exchanging data electronically and securely include speed, efficiency, lower risk and reduced cost.
A collaborative, nationwide approach to unify secure messaging providers is crucial to providing a seamless healthcare journey for patients, and for enabling simple and easy communication amongst healthcare providers.
Isn’t Secure Messaging Already In Place?
Imagine for a moment if our telephone service providers weren’t interoperable, for example your phone network wasn’t able to call someone you know who subscribes to another phone network. How effective would our telephone system be if this were the case? To date, we are in somewhat of a similar situation with secure messaging.
Despite the widespread adoption of secure messaging, the individual secure messaging service providers have approached messaging differently, resulting in incompatibility in many instances. The lack of interoperability has resulted in fragmented systems and communication.
Furthermore, messages and referrals generated by practitioners are often limited to providers listed in their local address book or directory, making it time consuming to locate contact details for providers outside their normal referral network. The above method also relies on the provider information being kept up to date by the practice, often leading to inaccurate information, possibly even providers that are no longer in operation.
What is Changing?
The Australian Digital Health Agency is leading a program of change, to enhance interoperability standards for secure messaging. This initiative is in direct support of the National Digital Health Strategy, to reduce barriers to using secure electronic exchange of health data and ensure interoperability between technologies. Two key changes will take place as part of this initiative.
First is the introduction of a federated provider directory capability, enabling clinical information systems and secure messaging delivery systems to search cross-directory to find accurate, trusted and validated healthcare provider electronic addresses.
Second, software providers are enhancing the message exchange format to meet an agreed standardized specification for message content – streamlined to improve interoperability across disparate service providers and clinical systems.
How is Best Practice Software Getting Involved?
Best Practice Software has actively participated in the collaboration between software providers and government bodies, to define interoperability standards for secure messaging solutions.
The development to enhance secure messaging and be conformant to the ADHA specification is currently in testing phase and the enhanced functionality will be available in Bp Premier Saffron and VIP.net Ruby SP3 in the coming months.
When Will Enhanced Secure Messaging be Available More Widely?
There are 42 software organisations taking part in the ADHA secure messaging enhancement initiative, the change program is scheduled to conclude this October so there are certainly exciting times ahead for improved data workflows and efficiencies!
Authored by:
Monica Reed Manager, Commercial & Customer Enablement at Best Practice Software
Things have changed just a bit since working from home as a Commercial Partnership Specialist. The morning commute has been replaced by a short walk to my desk. Not surprisingly, my caffeine intake has skyrocketed.
Providing Partner Support as a Commercial Partnership Specialist
Each morning after logging in and greeting the Commercial Partnerships team, I go through my emails and the to-do list. A usual day would be spent working through Partner Support cases that come through our CRM dashboard and any calls that filter down our line. I check on the dashboard throughout the day for cases from Partners requiring assistance with their integration with Bp products.
Being a (slight) perfectionist, there is always the constant battle to keep the partner cases in our queue to an absolute minimum, if not completely clear. When I hit the refresh button, the suspense is palpable. I’ve turned it into something of a game.
It can be a challenging but rewarding experience to assist our partners in resolving technical issues. Through working on different cases I have found myself exploring and learning more about Bp and healthcare overall. It has been great to learn from the team at Bp too, the experience of those around me is invaluable, and not in short supply.
Tech Reviews
In between handling partner support cases, I also conduct technical reviews with Bp Partnership applicants. As part of applying to join the Bp Partner Network, a technical review is performed to understand the applicant’s product. This includes their use cases and the access they require to different Bp products.
It’s an interesting experience to see what ideas businesses and Practices are generating. Not only are our technical reviews trying to determine whether an idea has value to a Practice, but also how these ideas positively impact the lives and wellbeing of patients. The information gathered from technical reviews are collated and a committee review is conducted at the end of each month where current and new applicants are presented for approval.
It helps to possess a reasonable amount of technical knowledge as a Commercial Partnership Specialist – being able to fully understand what each business or Practice is trying to achieve is crucial to accurately reviewing their applications.
…and More
To spice things up, the Commercial team has an endless array of projects that change things up from my usual support role. One week I could be calling our sites and creating email communications and videos as part of the Safescript roll out in Victoria. The next week I’m launched into helping with ePrescribing compliance testing, and assisting pilot sites with new versions to prescribe their first eScripts.
Filling the role of Commercial Partnership Specialist has provided a great amount of exposure in how the technical and commercial aspects of Bp intercept and work together.
The sound of the neighbourhood kids running around outside indicates that it’s time to start winding down. I look to wrap up jobs on that to-do list and check the calendar for what lies ahead tomorrow. And then it’s time to call it a day.
Actually, I might just check the CRM just one more time to make sure it’s clear.
Authored by:
Aaron Lim Commercial Partnership Specialist at Best Practice Software
It might surprise you to know that virtually all major practice management system vendors in Australasia have released, or are planning to release, their next generation solutions on the cloud. Cloud Computing is a trend that is sure to accelerate over time and is a transformation that will have a significant impact on the day-to-day operation of Practices and Practice Managers across all healthcare domains.
As Best Practice Software is undertaking the development of our own cloud-based platform, we are often asked by our clients what cloud computing entails, and what the benefits are over traditional desktop software. The following provides a brief insight into these questions.
What is Cloud Computing?
Cloud computing is a model for enabling on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction.
That’s quite a mouthful and not necessarily easy to understand, but it essentially identifies the five common characteristics of true cloud computing:
Broad network access This refers to the fact that resources in the cloud are available over multiple device types, ranging from common devices like laptops and workstations, to mobile phones and the like. Providers are no longer tied to the desktop or the location of their data, the benefits of which are becoming increasingly clear in these times.
On-demand self-service This refers to capabilities that manage provisioning and back-office functions. In non-cloud or traditional desktop environments, where the end user can self-provision without interacting with the provider, the downstream result has historically been inefficiency and waste. These new technologies now enable us to provide our customers with true self-service without incurring these penalties or service costs.
Resource pooling The scalability of the cloud is one of its most defining fundamental concepts. Without pooled computing, networks and storage, these services must be provisioned across multiple silos at great cost. Through resource pooling, multiple customers are sharing resources stored in the cloud with their peers, in much the same way as a telephone network operates. Because of this, the cost of resources is also shared between multiple customers.
Measured service These pooled resources can be easily monitored and reported, providing visibility into rates of resource consumption and the allocation of the costs associated with said consumption.
Rapid elasticity Elastic resources are critical in reducing costs. When accessing a cloud-based service, you only access the resources as and when you need the capacity. For most practices, a large percentage of costs associated with deploying applications stem from provisioning and maintaining a range of hardware resources. The purchase and rollout of these hardware resources requires forecasting of anticipated demand, rather than actual demand with a fixed capital expenditure commitment. The elasticity of the cloud means that you simply get what you need as and when you need it, and you only pay for what you use, resulting in a significant reduction in costs.
Cloud computing is not a single service fits all model.
There are a number of deployment models to suit different organisations. The two most prevalent deployment models used in the healthcare industry are the private cloud and public cloud.
Private cloud is generally only implemented in larger organisations due to the increased infrastructure costs that can be spread across greater number of users. They are generally designed by and built for a single customer to support specific functions critical for the success of a single line of business, and usually require more technical proficiency to maintain.
Public cloud is what is most people think of when they hear cloud computing system; it is multitenant capable and shared by a number of customers who may have nothing in common. They are typically less expensive to maintain, and leverage infrastructure provided by large tech providers such as Amazon with its AWS service and the competing Microsoft Azure service. This is the deployment model that is generally best suited for small Practices, and the variant that most Practice Managers will deal with and is the deployment model that Best Practice Software has selected for its cloud offering.
In summation, the incremental and exponential advances made in recent years has created a significant shift towards cloud computing adoption. The large number of practice management software and other health software vendors refreshing their products with cloud enablement underscores this.
Vendors benefit through shortening the time to market for new products and features, whilst at the same time delivering drastic cost reductions to customers.
The adoption of these cloud-enabled healthcare platforms will grow as users experience the benefits of a shortened enhancement lifecycle, without the associated operational disruption that comes from frequently installing desktop or client-server-based software solutions. Cloud computing brings the promise of never having to do a manual data update, or to endure the long wait for new releases to introduce new features or defect fixes. This cycle gets compressed from months, to weeks and days.
However, not all platform migrations to the cloud have been successful. Ultimately, the organisations that will be successful are those that understand that a move to the cloud is not merely a porting of technology, but rather a new way of thinking as to providing healthcare as a service, one that maximises all of the components of cloud computing.
Authored by:
Andre Broodryk Manager of Product Management at Best Practice Software
The current crisis has seen the adoption of digital services faster than ever before and it has proved that in many cases, remote care that’s supported by digital tools can be just as effective as traditional care when seeking to maximise patient engagement. From the moment a patient registers at a practice or hospital to post-treatment, there are a number of interchange points along the way that are key to delivering a positive patient experience. These range from arrival and check-in to engagement during treatment, post-care and telehealth.
Jayex acknowledges that patients who feel engaged and positive about their care are more satisfied and generally experience superior outcomes.
Digital tools mitigate the logistical challenges like organising patient files, appointment management, reporting etc., for staff working remotely. Many cloud-based patient engagement solutions bring a whole host of tools together in one place. Cloud-based digital platforms like Jayex online patient records, appointment booking, campaign management, and more can be accessed from anywhere. The fast adoption of these tools can be attributed to their quick integration with existing Practice Management systems. Moreover, the ability for patients to book online, request scripts and referrals, receive healthcare information and consult with their doctors remotely, reduces the risks of exposure for both staff and patients in the Practice.
If the recent upheavals have taught us anything, it’s that digital technology can be a vital resource in the modern waiting room.
How we handle healthcare has changed irrefutably and benefits of digital care are set to extend far beyond the current crisis and will remain a significant part of healthcare long after it’s over. Acting as the bridge between practice and patient, Jayex provides the Healthcare industry with advanced systems that maximise patient engagement and make patient management, workflow and communication easier, more efficient and more effective. Learn more about Jayex’s complete patient engagement platform.
World Blood Donor Day will be celebrated around the world on the 14th of June, and it marks the start of National Blood Donor Week in Australia, to recognise and thank those who voluntarily donate blood, and raise awareness of the critical need for regular donations. First celebrated in 2004, the 14th of June date was selected to recognise the birth anniversary of Karl Landsteiner who won a Nobel Prize in 1930 for his discovery of human blood groups and development of the ABO blood typing system.
So thank you, for your life-saving gift, to each of the 500,000 Australians who gave over 1.5 million donations to Lifeblood – and the 110,000 New Zealanders who gave over 150,000 donations to the NZ Blood Service. Hear from people who donate and the difference this has made in Australia and New Zealand.
Every week, Australia needs 29,000 blood donations. New Zealand needs 3,500.
Throughout the coronavirus restrictions on peoples’ movements, donations are, and remain, an essential health service. However, fewer people are donating than usual and donation centres experienced high rates of cancellations.
Donation centres are safe places to visit and have taken steps to ensure they stay that way via screening protocols, social distancing and additional hygiene measures to protect donors and staff. To help replenish and maintain stocks – donated blood has a shelf life of 42-days – new and existing donors are needed now.
Australians and New Zealanders are known for their generosity in times of need, including the recent requests for support during the bushfires which caused the closure of several donation centres, and the Whakaari/White Island eruption requiring additional universal plasma donations.
In addition to blood, donation centres are now collecting convalescent plasma – the liquid part of blood containing antibodies – from people who have recovered after a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 and have been symptom-free for at least 28-days to support clinical trials.
Here’s how you can make a difference:
Within Australia, confirm your eligibility here and book an appointment here
Within New Zealand, confirm your eligibility here and book an appointment here
Become a regular donor
Encourage your friends, family and colleagues to become regular donors
Raise awareness of World Blood Donor Day and National Blood Donor Week within your social networks
Give blood, and make the world a healthier place.
Authored by:
Monique Willis Lead Business Analyst at Best Practice Software
On the 6th of May, Australia’s first ePrescription was issued and dispensed in Victoria. We are thrilled to announce that the first electronic prescription in Australia was processed through Best Practice Software.
See below for the full press release from Fred IT, which includes a comment from Best Practice Software CEO, Dr. Frank Pyefinch.
Australia’s first electronic prescription successfully dispensed
Leading Australian prescribing and dispensing vendors collaborate to complete electronic prescription
Australia’s first paperless electronic prescription in primary care was successfully prescribed and dispensed in Victoria yesterday, marking a significant first step in the national delivery of electronic prescriptions.
The first electronic prescribing and dispensing occurred between Anglesea Medical and Anglesea Pharmacy. It used the “token” model where the doctor sends the electronic prescription along with a code or “token” to the patient by SMS or email. The patient then forwards or presents the code to their chosen pharmacy for dispensing.
According to Dr David Corbet at Anglesea Medical who prescribed the first electronic prescription, “The process is as simple as writing the prescription in the usual manner and, with the consent of the patient, selecting that the prescription is generated as an electronic prescription.”
Pharmacist Jason Bratuskins dispensed the first electronic prescription in his Anglesea pharmacy. He commented, “our patients and staff have been profoundly influenced by the isolation requirements of COVID-19, and it has been terrific to be part of efforts to re-define how we support our patients with alternative options for fulfilling prescriptions. I was pleased to see that this could sit comfortably alongside our existing processes.”
This week’s successful electronic prescription occurred using the Best Practice prescribing system, prescription exchange service eRx Script Exchange, Fred NXT Dispense and MedView Flow.
Pharmacist and CEO of Fred IT Group, Paul Naismith said, “the achievement of the first successful electronic prescription in primary care settings is a major step forward in Australia’s provision of a digital network that provides patients with flexibility for how they access their medications. I am very proud of the Fred and eRx teams which, through ongoing innovation and hard work, have achieved this result ahead of schedule in a very challenging work environment.”
CEO of Best Practice, Dr Frank Pyefinch, was thrilled to hear that the first electronic script had been successfully transferred using Best Practice Software, saying, “our team has pulled out all stops to deliver this important functionality as quickly as possible and we expect that it will confirm that electronic prescriptions are the way of the future. It is history in the making!”
The token model will work alongside the Active Script List (ASL) to provide patients with flexibility in how they digitally access their medications. This week’s success covered the entire electronic process of the token model: prescribing electronically in Best Practice, providing the patient with a token with the required number of repeats via eRx, sending the dispensing request to the pharmacy, integrating it into the pharmacy’s workflow, based on MedView Flow, and then dispensing in Fred NXT.
Fred CEO Paul Naismith emphasised that ongoing industry collaboration will be vital to the national delivery of electronic prescriptions. Naismith concluded, “the priority from here is to continue approving participating vendor systems and understand what is needed to prepare patients, prescribers and pharmacies for a national system of electronic prescriptions. The token model and ASL are both important components of a national approach which provides patients with the flexibility and security to manage their electronic prescriptions in collaboration with their local prescriber and pharmacist.”
Media Release originally published 7 May, 2020.
Video: ePrescribing Q & A for Patients
We encourage Practices to share this video with patients and staff, to help them understand the benefits of ePrescribing.
Since mid-March, when warnings against overseas travel began, over 200,000 citizens and residents have returned home to Australia, with thousands more arriving by plane each week. An enforced, 14-day hotel quarantine required significant resources to be deployed by State Governments Agencies from organising the Hotels willing to provide the services to a massive logistical operation to provide healthcare resources in a very short space of time.
In Victoria the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) sought out Dr. Nathan Pinskier, Director and Co-owner of the Medi 7 group of practices, and Clinical Advisor for the Australian Digital Health Agency to assist and manage the provision of medical services to the quarantined travellers. Working with DHHS, a group of Doctors was put together to support the healthcare needs of newly arrived quarantined Australians in hotels around Melbourne.
Shortly after the medical service commerced, Dr. Pinskier contacted Dr. Frank and Lorraine Pyefinch at 4:00 pm on Thursday, 9th April with an urgent request for assistance. He explained, “what started as a requirement for one doctor the previous Saturday has rapidly expanded into the provision of five doctors today and possibly even more in the next week or so, as more and more repatriation flights arrive from overseas. Our team of doctors has been providing consults through both telehealth and face-to-face appointments.”
Initially, this rapidly formed and mobilised team did not have a practice management system to capture clinical notes electronically, therefore raising the issues of data privacy, record retention, long term storage, archiving and the decision support provided by Bp Premier when it comes to allergies and medication. Here enters Team Bp.
Within an hour of the request, our team had provided 15 Bp Premier licences and enablement material, which allowed Dr. Pinskier’s in house IT team to configure the software over the Easter long weekend. On Wednesday, 15th April, we issued Dr. Pinskier with a further 10 licences to support the expanding group of doctors.
“We think it is fantastic that Nathan and his team have stepped up to help in this unprecedented public health emergency,” said Dr. Frank Pyefinch. “So we were delighted to quickly deliver a solution that will ensure accurate recording of patient encounters and provide for a safe clinical handover when their isolation periods have completed”.
Dr Pinskier has provided a hosted environment to access Bp Premier. The doctors access the software via a remote desktop login using either wifi or 4G. They have full functionality including the ordering of pathology online and also prescriptions. “This is great solution for doctors working across a number of hotels. It allows for the provision of safer and better coordinated healthcare,” Dr Pinskier said. “We thank Frank and Lorraine and their team for their fantastic assistance.”
Leading practice business analytics platform, Cubiko, releases a free dashboard to help practices continue patient care and manage the business impact of COVID-19.
Brisbane-based start-up, Cubiko, is releasing Cubiko Assist, a free distilled version of its main Practice intelligence software, to help Australian healthcare practices deal with the impact of COVID-19 and to reduce avoidable hospital admissions.
The pandemic has created a range of pressures for Practices including collapsing revenue as patients stay away (meaning some miss out on vital care), reduced income due to bulk billing arrangements for telehealth, unmanageable workload in some practices and workforce difficulties when staff are in quarantine or isolation.
‘It’s definitely not business as usual – it’s practice management in a pandemic,’ says Cubiko CEO, Chris Smeed. ‘We knew practices would need different tools for that. So we asked what they needed and then we built Cubiko Assist.’
Cubiko Assist enables Practices to identify and continue treating patients with high care needs to prevent them crash landing in hospital. It provides insights that equip Practices to make best use of available staff and resources, identifying the billing impact of lockdown measures and telehealth appointments. It also ensures coverage for upcoming appointments despite changes in doctors’ availability due to being quarantined or homeschooling children.
Cubiko Assist is designed to ensure there is no extra work, or spreadsheets or uploads required. The data is automated and integrates seamlessly with Bp Premier.
Many practices have already registered for the new software, which will roll out in April and be free for the next 6 months or until the pandemic is over.
‘It’s our contribution to fighting COVID-19,’ explains Smeed. ‘We can’t do what the doctors and practice managers on the frontline do. But we can equip them to do it well by giving them easy access to meaningful data so they can respond to COVID-19’s unprecedented impact on their practice.’
Cubiko Assist is proudly backed by a growing partnership that includes AAPM, AGPAL, Microsoft, Splice Marketing and Best Practice Software. These companies have galvanised around Cubiko Assist and committed to providing practices with insights and support to find effective responses to their Practice metrics.
Cubiko is a leading Practice business analytics platform, effortlessly combining all a Practice’s different data sources – Bp Premier, Xero and Tanda – into one easy-to-use platform to simplify task prioritisation, process improvement and profit growth.
As the government continues to expand funding for telehealth services in an effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19, practices are shifting to telehealth consultations to protect their practitioners and Practice staff.
Amongst patients, however, there still exists widespread confusion around what constitutes telehealth.
Is it bulk billed? Do I need to pay a gap? How do I get my scripts? What if I need a physical examination?
These are all questions that frequently arise.
Whitecoat has recently launched a Telehealth Hub that connects practitioners with patients requiring telehealth services. Patients can view practitioner profiles, including customer reviews, and book a telehealth consultation directly with their chosen practitioner or Practice.
It’s particularly useful for those unable to access their regular GP, as a key feature is the ability to connect with practitioners offering virtual consultations Australia-wide.
The service also helps to de-mystify telehealth for patients with answers to frequently asked questions. These topics are being expanded as new threads arise and include links to relevant government resources.
Whitecoat is currently giving Best Practice Software customers the opportunity to offer a listing on the Whitecoat Telehealth hub for free. Doing so provides your Practice with access to the Whitecoat’s annual audience of 2.5 million users.
To list your Practice on the Whitecoat Telehealth directory, simply fill out this short form.
