Many small medical clinics, radiology departments, imaging centers, dental and veterinary offices are making the switch to digital imaging. DICOM Solutions allow you to do this easily and economically. By using ordinary personal computers, you simply add PACS software, which allows for film imagery to be converted to digital images. No more high costs for purchasing film, film developing as well as the risk of exposure to toxic developing chemicals when moving to dicom conversion software.

DICOM Solutions stands for digital imaging and communication in medicine solutions. The beauty of digital imaging is that these pictures can be sent at digital speeds to any doctor, hospital or clinic that has Internet access. This has revolutionized the transfer of patient images for consultations with the best doctors no matter where in the world they are located, because with the click of a mouse those images can be at the doctor's computer in a matter of seconds.

A dicom conversion is possible because of PACS software. PACS stands for picture archiving and communication system, and is the software that allows for digital imaging of films. Another nice feature of the dicom conversion is that images can taken in several modalities, including x-rays, CT scans, MRIs, mammograms, ultrasounds and others, and all can be converted to digital images. Making the change to digital is very cost effective, because you can focus on the specific digital features that your medical office needs, and switch over by retrofitting the radiology equipment you currently possess.

Many medical clinics switch to DICOM because of the ease of using the dicom archive. In order to comply with HIPAA standards of patient record retention of seven to ten years, hospitals and clinics in the past have had to use a great deal of space to physically store the paper records. It also took a lot of hours of work in terms of filing, archiving and retrieval of patient records. Now with the dicom archive, the physical space you need for storage of patient records is only the size of your server. Patient information is easily recorded, stored and retrieved from a computer workstation that has the correct software installed.

The dicom archive also helps clinics to provide better patient care. Although rare, it did occasionally happen that hard copy patient records were misfiled, leading to unhealthy results for patients. With the dicom archive, there is a much reduced chance of such errors occurring.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Wayne_Hemrick

It's true, Medicare supplements aren't as glitzy as you might like, but sometimes boringly predictable is a good thing. That's what makes Medicare supplements a good bet if you're looking for extra health care coverage and don't think you want to make the leap to private health care insurance carriers.

The various plans offered in Medicare are truly standardized, meaning they all offer the same thing and there isn't any guesswork about it. They all have the same networks and are literally identical from one health care insurance company to another. Well--almost.

The only one area in which these plans are not equal is in the pricing. Each insurance company can sell these plans at any price they set. Now that either means they're charging what the market will bear, or someone thought they'd run a number up the flagpole to see if anyone saluted.

There you have it-- the big differences in these plans is the price. So that means it actually makes good sense to shop around for Medicare supplement plans and do some price comparisons. The pricing issue isn't really a secret. It's just that a lot of people don't bother to call around because they hate talking to insurance agents. Pity, because even calling just three agents could save you money.

If you don't believe insurance companies would actually charge you more for the same thing other companies sell, then read page 15 of the document called Choosing a Medigap Policy which states in black and white "There can be a big difference is premiums that different insurance companies charge for exactly the same coverage." Now in polite company this would be called taking advantage of consumers. In not so polite company this may be regarded as a rip off.

If you want a deal on your health care coverage, be smart and talk to an agent who has a large pool of companies to work with. That way you can be assured of getting a decent price for your premiums.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Richard_Cantu

Medicare Advantage Plans may be an advantage to some people, depending on their requirements. For others, however, there is no advantage to them at all; in fact, they are oft heard to be called major pains in the - pocketbook. Texas health insurance agents can tell you this information if you ask.

So let's talk finances for a bit. There are people looking to be totally covered, not having to pay a dime when they need services. Then there are others who can afford to pay the 20% difference between what the doctor charges and the insurance company pays (the other 80%). Each group has its own wants and needs, but how each group is actually serviced is another matter entirely.

For instance, let's say you are in one smaller network and have a doctor that you really like. Things are going well for about a year or so and then the doctor decides s/he wants to opt out of the network. Great, this leaves you stuck unless you try and follow your doctor. Good luck on that one.

Following your doctor involves finding out if s/he will take other Medicare plans/ supplements or not. In the alternative, you may see the doctor and pay full freight to do so. If your doctor makes the decision to go the fee for service route, you might find out s/he refuses to accept the terms of the plan. That means you pay the bill.

What's going on here is that coverage options are so confusing it's difficult to get straight answers. With the Medicare Advantage Plans their coverage is fairly black and white - what you see is what you get (mostly). If you choose to go with private health insurance you might think you're covered. Wrong, as the insurance company may say they don't have to cover your particular case. This is a little like playing Russian roulette.

To get Medicare Advantage or not to get the advantage and go private are haunting questions that are usually only resolved when you've had personal experience either way. The bottom line is, for coverage that makes the most sense Medicare supplements are the better route.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Richard_Cantu

A couple of things happened today that I thought I would like to share with you. All elements of your practice can learn from these experiences; the front office, nursing staff, medical billing staff, management, cleaning personnel.

The first involves the use of illicit substances. An employee in a local school system cafeteria burned her hand. On the surface a simple matter to be sure, but once she presented at the medical office for care, the board agreed to accept her as a worker's compensation case and shortly after that conversation the practice phone rang again. This time the board requested a drug test. The patient was advised and consented to the test. Now remember, this is now a worker's comp case and the patient in accepting that status does not maintain the right to privacy with respect to this or any future visit regarding this injury. Once the report on the drug test came back the patient now wants that information to be held back because it is damaging. Most boards of education are dependent on state and federal money to pay the bills and along with that money comes certain strings; one being the safe and drug free schools program. The likelihood is that a job will be lost, could be some criminal consequences. What do you think?

The second thing that happened today involves a practice that we have helped for many years. The front office employee left the practice in a lurch. But that is not half of the problem. She left with the front office copy of the protocols and in that copy were most of the current log ons and passwords for the various insurance companies they serve. That in itself was bad enough except that just before leaving, she took the liberty of setting herself up as the administrator on the accounts and changed all of the passwords. The provider was in a panic because they are in the habit of verifying all insurance companies and most of those they are doing on-line. I assured him that we would get on top of it for him and that in the interim we could use our log ons and/or we could use the phones to get insurance verification information for him. This is a task that is usually performed in the provider office, but it is just one more little thing that we bring to the table in medical billing. For no extra charge we are happy to cover that base on a short term basis and in the meantime re-establish all of the log ons and passwords the ensure HIPAA compliance. By close of business we had managed to get all of the log ons and passwords changed with the exception of two and the proper paperwork on those two were being mailed so they could be changed. The provider was ecstatic at the promptness of the actions and my staff is to be commended for going above and beyond. Also, the staff member doing the work had arranged to take the day off tomorrow, but has now volunteered to come in just to be available should this practice need our assistance.

Now how do both of these tie into your practice? Both deal with the legal liabilities of the practice. Before these matters appear, you need to establish the proper protocols to handle each of these occurrences and to ensure that you are not plagued by a staff that presents with either or both of the issues above.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Nat_Wynn