Therap in the Mid-Atlantic

During our Central VA user group meeting held at Heart Havens in Richmond VA. Many providers seasoned, new and just introduced discussed many different aspect of Therap. The providers who have yet to purchase Therap were able to talk to providers using the system and find out how GREAT of a tool it is. The new providers were able to learn from the seasoned providers the steps to help them get things going. Join us next time for a wonderful roundtable discussion on Therap!

The Therap User Meeting in Richmond, Virginia – 05-07-2012  has only one problem. We are running out of space.  Jennifer of Heart Havens is borrowing chairs and looking for more meeting rooms. You can still register for the session on therapservices.net and we will try to make sure that no one has to share a chair.  There are still plenty of spaces for the Therap User Meeting for Northern Virginia – 05-25-2012 probably because we started with a larger meeting room. Hope to see everyone at one of the sessions.

On April 26th Therap attended the Maryland Health Conference for DDA Nurses which is sponsored by the Maryland Developmental Disabilities Administration.  A last minute call was received from DDA  with the invitation due to requests from Therap customers to have Therap attend. The topic of the conference was the Maryland, Medical Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment and Medical Decision Making (MOLST) form. Therap’s Advanced Directives feature makes it easy to record that an Individual has a MOLST form and to direct staff to where the MOLST form is stored digitally.

The Therap Maryland Users Group was held on April 23rd at the Deaf Independent Living Association (DILA) in Salisbury MD.  Over the course of the day a number of people attended and one the issues that has to be worked on with other Maryland Providers is re-purposing some current custom forms to meet state requirements more fully. One form is the 45 day nursing form.

One of the most interesting topics at the MD Users Group was seeing how DILA has gone virtual with Therap. Since all DILA employees already have Blackberry smart phones DILA purchased Blackberry tablets for employees.  The tablets tether to the phones minimizing  Internet access cost and DILA employees can spend more time focusing on the the people they support and less time traveling to the office. The DILA folks I talked to said the 7 inch tablets can be difficult learn to use but the convenience more than makes up for the learning curve.

Blackberry phone and tablet used at DILA

I talked to a number of people at the Provider Administrator Conference about tracking the condition of adaptive equipment. There are several examples of Individual Service Programs for that task that providers have put in the Global Template Library. The Daily Adaptive / Aversive Equipment Checklist is a straightforward way to record basic daily equipment checks. The Adaptive Equipment Inspection takes the approach of developing a broad description of specific features of different types of equipment that need to be checked such as wheelchairs, walkers, bed rails, etc.. As the template is assigned to an individual, for example, with a wheelchair the tasks that do not apply can be deleted. Additional tasks such as acquisition data, repair descriptions and dates can also be added. The ISP approach can provide consistency in when equipment is checked and how it is checked.

Examples in Global Template Library:

Adaptive Equipment Inspection Adaptive Equipment Inspection … 08/26/2009

Daily Adaptive / Aversive Equipment Checklist .                                   … 01/30/2012

As I talk to current and prospective Therap users there is a lot of confusion about electronic health record regulations. The other day at a conference I said that Therap is working on meeting HITECH standards and CCHIT certification. The question that came back at me was “but has Therap met the “meaningful use” standards. That question is not so easy and I am hearing it more often. The question also highlights the carrot and stick approach to EHRs.
The stick in the EHR story is the HITECH ACT. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) established the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH). HITECH will require the use of Electronic Health Records (EHRs) by Health Care Providers. Based on HITECH an EHR must:
• Include all patient demographic and clinical health information, such as medical history and problem lists; and have the capacity to:
o provide clinical decision support;
o support physician order entry;
o capture and query information relevant to health care quality; and,
o exchange electronic health information with, and integrate such information from other sources.
As defined in ARRA “Health Care Providers” includes nursing facilities, home health entities, or other long term care facilities, etc. It is likely that any Medicaid program that provides health support will be required to have an EHR at some time.
The Office of the National Director for Health Information Technology (ONC) has been charged with the task of verifying that EHRs meet the HITECH requirements. To that end ONC contracted with the Certification Commission for Health Information Technology (CCHIT) to establish and provide the testing and certification for EHRs that meet the HITECH provisions. Therap is currently pursuing CCHIT certification as a Long Term and Post Acute Care (LTPAC) EHR.
The carrot in the EHR story is “meaningful use”. ARRA also defines Meaningful Use. Some Health Care Providers can earn incentives by making ”meaningful use” of EHR capabilities. The critical point is that the EHR must be used. For example a physician cannot receive an incentive for having an EHR that can e-prescribe medication. To earn an incentive the physician must make “meaningful use” of an EHR by e-prescribing. Since “meaningful use” is tied to incentive payments the acceptance of “meaningful use” for incentives will be the responsibility of CMS.
What is being certified by CCHIT in respect to HITECH is that an EHR meets the criteria to improve the quality of care for individuals and is based on HITECH requirements. While “Meaningful Use” certification establishes eligibility for incentive payments based on the use of an EHR.
Therap is working on CCHIT certification and has made substantial progress in that area with a target for completion in 2012. However Therap cannot participate in “Meaningful Use” incentives since only Health Care Providers eligible for incentives can apply.

Therap has added a new feature to Custom Forms that responds to many inquiries /suggestions that Therap has received. That feature is a Custom Form that allows for the tracking of jobs or volunteer activities a person has in the community.  Each entry records the history of a person’s activity with a specific employer or volunteer agency. The information collected includes start date, end date, salary history, schedule, hours scheduled history, level of support history, and more. By using this form it is easy to locate where a person is working, when the person is working and statistical information such as if support is fading, salary changing, hours changing and so on.

The Employment / Volunteer Record creates a resume so it is easy to review a person’s work or volunteer history online. Since this is a new feature I hope that everyone that supports people working or volunteering in the community will give it a try and send in feedback.

Over the last year Stephen and Deb from Therap’s Support Team have toured West Virginia extensively providing training and support to Therap users. Due to the increasing interest and growth of the customer base in West Virginia Therap will be hosting a Regional Conference/WV User Group meeting at the Flatwoods Days Hotel and Conference Center in Sutton, WV. This conference is designed to focus on West Virginia issues and concerns and will have two presentation tracks. One track will focus on West Virginia Issues and there will be a track on general Therap applications as well. Agencies or individuals with questions, recommendation for topics, or who would like to lead or chair a session can contact me, at ken.slavin@therapservices.net.

The conference is arranged to start midmorning on the 24th and end the afternoon of the 25th to provide for an easy commute. I would encourage agencies to invite others to attend. Remember the Therap Points program: www.therapservices.net/pointsprogram. If you invite folks from agencies not using Therap to attend you can earn points to cover conference fees for the WV Users group or other Therap conferences.

This conference will provide an excellent opportunity to learn about features in Therap you may not be using and to talk to other providers in the state about how they are using Therap.

Conference Registration

Hello everyone, this is Ken Slavin from Therap, and I will be sharing my thoughts and experiences here soon, so check back later!