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Austin Regional: Wireless-Linked Computers Speed Billing at Medical Clinics Medical clinics are fast becoming the leading alternative to hospital-based treatment. Austin Regional Clinic is a collection of multispecialty clinics in Austin, Texas, employing 130 medical professionals who treat hundreds of patients a day. Austin Regional recently installed a wireless LAN to handle the increasing patient load and expedite insurance billing. Application: Medical Professionals Transmit Patient Service Information Directly to a Billing System To minimize the paperwork and its associated costs and to reduce the delay in billing, Austin Regional decided in 1994 to automate its billing process. It gave medical professionals at 11 of its 19 clinics pen-based, hand-held computers that would accept patient service information and transmit it to the central billing system. To link the computers to each clinic's central server, Austin Regional installed wireless LAN adapters on computers in each clinic's existing wired network.
Now medical professionals at Austin Regional can record office visits, lab work, X-rays, and other treatments and submit billing information on the spot. The wireless LAN uploads the information directly to the clinic's server; in turn, the hard-wired LAN transfers the information to the corporate database. Bills are issued within 24 hours of a patient's visit.
Benefits: Faster Billing, Installation and Maintenance Cost Savings, Better Work Flow Furthermore, says Nudd, "eliminating massive amounts of paper has not only reduced paper handling costs, it has cut down on transcription errors, which in turn has improved work flow."
Nudd calculates that each clinic will fully recover the cost of installing its system only 1.2 years after the date of installation. Even more important, the wireless system gives medical professionals at the clinics a tool that is quick and easy to use.
Installation Size Back to Healthcare Applications
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