RSMUS.comAutomating Hospital Accounting Using EMRConnect
For many hospitals and healthcare providers, a troubling disconnect persists between the clinical and financial sides of the operation. Doctors and nurses provide care. Accountants track the costs and revenues created. They are two halves of the same process—yet they function in separate silos that rarely stay in sync.
For many healthcare accountants, getting essential financial data means relying on manual processes to find the numbers in electronic medical records (EMRs), move them into the accounting system, then double-check for errors and omissions. It’s a time-consuming undertaking. And since human errors are inevitable, it causes as many mistakes as it catches.
Handling data by hand is distracting and demoralizing for accountants, but even worse is the effect on data quality and financial integrity. Key facts get distorted while in transport to accounting, leaving decision-makers with an inaccurate or incomplete (or both) financial record. In a competitive and compliance-heavy industry like healthcare, success and stability requires careful financial management. Manual data management only undermines that effort.
Previously, the only solution was to direct more time, staff, and budget towards the problem. For hospitals and providers that use Sage Intacct, however, there’s another option: putting the whole process on autopilot.
Introducing EMRConnect
Sage Intacct is the only financial management platform available with EMRConnect: a smart tool that allows information to flow easily and automatically from EMRs into the accounting system.
Even though EMRConnect will exclusively send data to Sage Intacct, it will extract data from any EMR system, including EPIC and all other vendors.
Accountants simply have to extract the data from the EMR system in any file format. EMRConnect can then automatically bring that data into Sage Intacct, convert file formats as necessary, and save the data into the master record. The whole process takes just a few clicks and less than a couple of minutes.
To make things even easier, EMRConnect supports scheduled automation, letting accountants plan what moves over to Sage Intacct and when. It keeps a record of each integration and general ledger transaction; bypasses the need to use the Import feature; supports multi-entity accounting; and permits imports of multiple files from multiple EMR sources. In so many ways, EMRConnect gives accountants flexibility and control over data, plus automation to make moving it effortless at any scale.
Having a tool that can complete this process saves accountants substantial amounts of time while unearthing new insights, leaving only one question: What will healthcare accountants do with all the new assets at their disposal?
Benefits of EMRConnect
EMRConnect automates data flows from medical records into Sage Intacct. And while saving time and preventing errors are two big advantages of automating manual workflows, the benefits are so much bigger.
EMRConnect has a transformative impact on accountants and the organizations they serve because it gives decision-makers the data, metrics, and analysis they need to make informed decisions, along with the time to consider those decisions carefully. Before, accountants had to waste countless working hours just managing data, and proceed with data they knew was outdated, incomplete, or errant. Now, the situation is reversed: accountants have the best information available with the least effort necessary.
Removing obstacles that stand between the clinical and administrative sides of healthcare has a positive impact for all involved. Hospitals can finally get the 360-degree visibility needed to understand exactly what’s working, what’s not, and what changes are in order. This was a guessing game in the past. With EMRConnect regularly updating Sage Intacct, unknowns and assumptions are replaced by data and discernment.
It can’t guarantee the right choice or preferred outcome. Nothing can. However EMRConnect increases the odds significantly.
Start Automating Hospital Accounting
Since EMRConnect works agnostically with all EMR systems, anyone with Sage Intacct is ready to get started. RSM can implement and optimize EMRConnect for any-size healthcare organization, or handle a Sage Intacct implementation, as well.
Automating the hard parts of healthcare accounting isn’t just possible—it’s practical. Contact RSM to put the pieces in place.
