Doctors have an abundance of patient-facing software and hardware solutions; while the variety is welcomed, it is sometimes hard to figure out what is best for one’s practice. As the Co-Founder of an EHR company, I’ve come across a series of modern practice set-ups and have found some similarities in the toolkits or “black bags” of some of the most efficiently run medical offices. Based on my meetings with hundreds of physicians, here’s some tips and insight on solutions and technology for the doctor of the future.

Patient Access

Patient access provide your patients with access to their medical record, including key information like prescriptions, allergies and lab results. Additionally, a portal can provide your patients with the ability to view and pay their bills, send and receive messages from their doctor and schedule appointments. Patient portals provide patients with all of the features mentioned above, and some like drchrono’s onpatient provide easy access through the cloud or an app and this is a big one, the ability to synchronize with Apple’s latest Health app and share their wellness data with their physician in an easy-to-digest format.

Electronic Health Records (EHR)

Paper has become a thing of the past in most doctors’ offices. From Meaningful Use requirements to the need for a better doctor-patient experience, doctors are embracing EHRs in droves. Of course, like everything else, some solutions are better (or even far better) than others. When selecting an EHR, look for a solution that is server-less, allows for easy access via cloud or iPad and iPhone (via native apps, not cloud), includes advanced features like speech-to-text, free draw and HIPAA-compliant file storage and sharing. Additionally, your solution should integrate billing, prescriptions, and faxing into the app itself.

Look for one that offers a free account and complimentary demos so you can try it out before you sign-up. You can sign-up for a free demo of drchrono here.

COST: FREE

Patient Check-In

Forget the days of handing a clipboard to a patient and asking them to fill out long forms, instead, utilize a check-in app. Hand your patient an iPad or other hardware and have them fill out customized forms easily on the device; information is transferred to the front desk, in real time, to review. We find Patient Check-In to be one of the most popular and efficient apps for our customers.

COST: Free

Hardware Must Haves

Laptops

The best laptops today on the market are the Macbook Air and the Macbook Pro Retina 13 or 15 inch; they are extremely fast, reliable, easy to use and the quality is amazing.

COST: $899.00+

iPad

I recommend an iPad Mini 3  or an iPad Air 2; the Retina display is excellent and the two integrated microphones integrated with both models ensure that your voice will be picked up at an extremely high rate if you are using EHR features like medical speech-to-text.

COST: $399.99+

Apple Cinema Display

For any doctor who is using a Mac or iPad, an Apple cinema display is a must have. The screen provides you with an extra 27 inches of screen space, making sure you have enough real estate to get your work done.

COST: $999.00

Apple TV

Perhaps the most underrated piece of hardware is the Apple TV. Doctors can utilize AirPlay, which allows doctors the ability to share their laptop, iPad or iPhone screen to a larger TV (even very large TVs). With the swipe of a few fingers, a doctor can project their device on a large screen, and share a medical record with patients or colleagues. The best part, Apple TV only costs $99.00 dollars!

COST: $99.00

Scanner

Doctors need a great scanner to scan papers at high speeds. One scanner family I’ve seen used most frequently are Fujitsu ScanSnap Scanners; these are small very fast scanner, scan double-sided, and can also scan to PDF and other file formats with the click of a button.

COST: Varies

Printer

HP printers are a great idea; they are dependable and work very well with both PC and Macs.

COST: Varies

eFax Services

The most savvy of electronic medical records platforms have fax services built in. For those who want a fax service outside of their EHR, there are great fax services like HelloFax these services allow you to send and receive faxes from your computer.

Cost: FREE+

Article by Daniel Kivatinos, COO and Co-Founder, drchrono

Daniel drives direction, brand vision, and business strategy for drchrono. Daniel’s focus has been in the technology space since 2001, as a software engineer and entrepreneur. Daniel holds an M.S. in Computer Science and a B.S. in Computer Science & Psychology from Stony Brook University.