Navigating Healthcare Compliance and Efficiency with Document Management Software in Skilled Nursing Facilities

As skilled nursing facilities (SNFs) take on increasingly complicated roles in the healthcare community, it can be difficult for them to meet the dual objectives of adhering to changing compliance requirements while striving for greater efficiencies. Often, SNFs have outdated, duplicated, or incorrect patient care forms stashed in filing cabinets—and contend with time-intensive email communications and documents scattered across devices. This is neither compliant nor efficient.

Related: Prevent Financial and Legal Issues by Avoiding Duplicate Health Records.

How Document Management Software Helps Compliance with HIPAA and Efficiency

It is imperative for all involved: administrators, healthcare providers, staff, and patients—for these facilities to stay compliant. This is not an easy undertaking since what is required compliance in healthcare is constantly changing. Administrative documents, patient records, and other essential information must meet the stringent requirements set by HIPAA and other regulatory laws. 

A tool designed for document management eases the burden of organization and can ensure complete compliance, in addition to streamlining all documents and creating a more efficiently productive workplace. This tool is a Document Management Software, or DMS.

Here are some of the ways DMS can significantly enhance an SNFs compliance and efficiency:

1.   Dedicated Compliance Capabilities: DMS solutions have been specifically designed to help healthcare organizations adhere to complex and ever-changing HIPAA regulatory requirements. They’re equipped with tools like access controls to ensure only users with the proper credentials can work with sensitive patient information. Further, they deploy robust encryption mechanisms to safeguard data from the very real dangers of potentially devastating security breaches.
2.   Automated Compliance Reporting: In SNFs, consistent reporting is a critical component of compliance. DMS can automate report generation to save time and guarantee accuracy. Whether you need incident reports or quality improvement initiatives, compliance reporting helps keep SNFs on track and efficient.
3.   Version Control: It’s easy to fall into non-compliance without version control, since this capability ensures everyone is working with the most up-to-date document. It efficiently tracks all changes and all users, so there is a timeline and audit trail in case something needs to be revisited. This feature keeps all information transparent, essential for an investigation or compliance audit.
4.   Training and Education: With proper education and support, DMS is a powerful tool for compliance and efficiency. The human factor is always challenging. It is where many malicious actors gain entry, as employees fall for phishing bait or other schemes. One important way to counter these threats is by educating users on how to identify threats and report them. Ongoing support will also help users recognize evolving attack approaches and also keep them up-to-date on compliance requirements with training materials, policy updates, and compliance guidelines. 
5.   Disaster Recovery & Downtime Operations: Since compliance requirements usually require SNFs to have comprehensive disaster recovery and business continuity plans, DMS will deliver on this with regular data backups, secure cloud-based storage, and effective recovery capabilities. This will guard against natural disasters, bad actors, and other challenges.
   
   

Related: How to Create a Downtime Readiness and Recovery Plan.

Digidoc Delivers for SNFs

Not only can DMS assure compliance, but it also streamlines workflows and helps eliminate human error, making operations more efficient. DigiDoc offers the critical components to which SNFs need to adhere for compliance with HIPAA regulations, including specific compliance capabilities, automated reporting, version control, training and education, and disaster recovery. To learn how DigiDoc can help your SNF achieve compliance and greater efficiency, contact our expert team today for a customized demo.