So today, our speakers are Molly Van Oort, Director of Specialty Solutions, and Jenna Hagen, Director of Application Specialists, both with NextGen Healthcare. So I'm going to go ahead and turn over to Molly to get us started today. Perfect. Thanks, Jessica. Good morning and good afternoon. I'm Molly Van Oort, Specialty Solutions Director at NextGen Healthcare, and I welcome you to our webinar session today, Enhancing Orthopedic Practice Efficiency, Innovations in Patient Experience, Automation, and Analytics. This webinar is in partnership with AAOE, and I encourage you to join us at INSPIRE, the 2025 Annual AAOE Conference in Atlanta, May 2nd through the 5th. Today, we have an exciting session for you. Patient experience, automation, and analytics are key elements in helping your practice achieve greater efficiency, especially in light of current challenges with staff retention and hiring. To lead us down this practice efficiency path is Jenna Hagen. Jenna is a Director of Application Specialists here at NextGen, leveraging her clinical and administrative background before NextGen, specifically in the orthopedic market. Her teams conduct specialized product demonstrations as market experts, and also manage client success through discovery and optimization engagements. Jenna, I'll pass it to you. Awesome. Thank you, Molly and team, and great to be here with everyone. Really excited to take you through the content. As Molly was explaining a little bit about my background, specifically within the orthopedic and musculoskeletal space, I've had a good bit of non-traditional and traditional experience of working in clinical care leading coverage at high schools, within counties, but also for the majority of my experience working within clinic and the OR as a first assist, driving physical therapy treatment as a provider, but also opening up those departments and organizations, and ultimately leading an orthopedic office before my time at NextGen. It's really exciting to be working with NextGen Healthcare and working with our orthopedic market space, helping to really optimize the utilization technology, but really help to consult and engage with the struggles that organizations such as yourself are really facing out there in the market, and how can we better drive efficiency, but not only for staff, also for patients. A couple of key things that we'll walk through today is really where the market is seeing a shift, a need for organizations to really get ahead and not only lean on technology, but really drive those efficiency factors within their organization. So, let's go ahead and kick it off and get started today. A couple of key things as we talk through, when we look at the evolution of the journey of healthcare, right, when we were paper charts and navigating to electronic EHR systems, and over time really evolving through cure certification, meaningful use, MIPS requirements, the evolution of healthcare out there continues to evolve and change, and really right now we're at the forefront of AI technology, and what does AI mean, and how do we leverage it? Is it surface level where we're just really throwing on technology on top of another piece of technology that can read into data, but is it integrated AI to where it's really kind of developed within core technology and driving efficiency and workflows that are meaningful for your organization, but also patient experience. That's a huge bucket out there that is really becoming a non-negotiable for organizations, especially patients that we're going to talk about through a lot of really significant data. When we consider the utilization of AI to where, you know, a year or two ago it was, that's not possible, to, wow, I didn't get it quick enough, to, you know, where it's going to go over the coming years as integration and development really continues to evolve. It's really piquing curiosity and interest out there and really getting highly adopted within organizations to drive that efficiency, especially as providers are still experiencing this burnout, as organizations are still experiencing stock turnover, but also as payer reimbursements are really skinning down and getting tight and hard to navigate out there in the market space. When we talk about the evolution of healthcare and we really consider it in that closed loop patient and provider experience, there's a couple key things to consider here. Really truly looking at an integrated platform with co-developed enhanced technology that's really not just sitting surface level, that really is providing that true integration for an organization, but not just considering that patient experience of technology, but also the provider experience and really the support staff. Is it helping to drive that revenue integrity for you as an organization by influencing that top line and bottom line when we look at the efficiencies? I can speak firsthand when I came from practice and was a consumer myself of many technologies within the market space, that the onus was not really balanced, right? The patient could have a really seamless, easy experience of maybe filling out an electronic form that would surface to them, but my staff was still having to print and scan or at least manually enter the data into my EHR system because that true discrete integration wasn't there. So, the patient felt like they had a great experience, but they may still have then suffered a little bit when they came in practice because they're either having to repeat themselves because my staff wasn't able to manually enter it in quick enough or maybe it got manually entered in incorrectly because we introduced the opportunity for error, not being able to automatically pull in that patient information, which then drove down provider satisfaction because the providers are bogged down, their schedules are backing up because the support staff are having to really take the onus of all that manual entry. The flip side is that when my support staff had automated entry or seamless access to even just payment collections, for example, the patient had a bad experience because there were a couple of different avenues that we were soliciting out to collect that money, and they're getting frustrated and not really knowing was it us collecting the money when the different areas such as a phone call or an email or a text message looked and sounded and felt very different to the patient. So, my staff had really seamless payment posting experience, but the patient was dissatisfied and really didn't trust the process. So, when we continue to evolve through that closed loop experience, it's really important to understand, and we as an organization understand and work with clients out there in the market, but also clients existing using this technology to really optimize and find the true value in that efficiency. The reality is that patients need access into an organization in a variety of different ways. A lot of chatter out there in the market about offering that digital front door, but should it just be a front door? You have patients within your organization that we want to retain. We want them to have a great experience, and we want to understand their satisfaction so that we can continue to drive that good experience and keep them going through that true closed loop experience and staying as a patient within the practice. You as an organization are getting those referrals inbound. Are your staff having to take those faxes and sort through them and then call those patients and get them coordinated if they're willing and able, or are you leveraging technology that can automate out the communication to the patient just even as a friendly touchpoint to say, hey, we received a referral. We'll be in touch soon to get you coordinated. Those automations of taking seconds from a system can really drive minutes to hours to days of efficiencies for you as an organization, and where are we capturing those good reviews to also drive inbound referrals and patients searching for care within organizations? But it really doesn't just stop there at that patient experience. If we can really start to automate and drive the efficiency of technology out there through electronic forms and pull it within a system and then leverage those AI or provider efficiency tools to really compile that meaningful conversation. Let the patient give you their information and their history electronically. Let the provider spend that one-on-one meaningful time with the patient having a conversation while technology is driving the documentation of it on the back end and really starting to make that very detailed, structured soap note. And then allowing for that quick documentation, allowing for that great patient experience of getting in and out of the office much quicker to then help to drive the billing cycle and getting that information and claims out the door, getting revenue back in the door much quicker. We know from a lot of data points that patients, in fact, 67.8% of patients prefer to communicate via text message. So ensuring that platforms are offering technology to securely message back and forth with a patient, not just email or through a portal experience, but through a secure text communication is incredibly important. We also know that 35% of patients are managing their care after business hours. So unless you are an organization that is offering staff to manage phones or have those on-call after-hours phone lines for patients to triage those inbound calls, you as an organization are placing yourself at risk for no-show volume, last-minute cancellations, provider lack of productivity on their schedules because patients are having to manage it during business hours only when their preference is after business hours. And so we're going to take you through a bit of those conversations and really kind of show you what that true integrated closed-loop approach looks like and where organizations such as yourself are really starting to leverage those non-negotiable workflows. I know for myself, I recently moved cities and am trying to get healthcare coordinated. And I say recently, it's been about a year and a half, but I still haven't coordinated all of my own personal care yet because it's been very hard. It's hard for me to find organizations that allow for online self-scheduling or allow for me to ask a question inbound online without having to leave a voicemail or call. I recently showed up to an organization and was given a clipboard with 12 pieces of paper to fill out and watch their staff scan it. And the provider asked me the questions again, because it wasn't scanned in by the time I got back to my visit with them. So I know such as myself, but also just really working and consulting with organizations out there in the marketplace and clients within the technology, the non-negotiable experience as a patient is not just myself. It's definitely amongst us out there in the market and organizations really need to start driving and leveraging that technology. When we look at this technology and what that closed loop experience really looks like, whether it's in a native proprietary technology, whether it's co-developed partnered and preferred technology that's integrated within this solution and not just leveraging APIs or sitting on top of technology, that's really important because that's really where we're driving efficiency for both the patient and for the practice in those top line and bottom line revenues. So when I, as a patient, get that automated text message on my phone right here that you're seeing, a couple of key things that I want to talk about, you're seeing that appointment reminder there at the top where the patient replied reschedule via text message. I, as a patient, didn't have to click that link to then go through a workflow to ask to reschedule my appointment. I truly could reply through that SMS workflow. And the system was able to auto-generate those next three availabilities. A couple of key things to consider here. When I was in practice, especially in that orthopedic space, I very much know the hesitancy to let patients schedule their own appointments. A follow-up is not just a follow-up, right? It could be an MRI review. It could be a PRP number two injection. It could be a post-operative appointment within 90 days or without 90 days. And so really being able to fine tune what we offer for availability through self-scheduling is nerve-wracking for organizations out there. But imagine a world where self-scheduling is actually just driving the productivity for your patient to have access to reschedule their appointment very quick and very easy. If I'm already matched as a patient to my provider, to the reason I'm coming in and to that location, allowing me to reschedule my appointment, whether it's at 6.42 at night in that instance or 2 a.m. like the data we see, that's allowing for you as an organization to keep those schedules full and productive and your staff not have those voicemails that they're having to spend a lot of time listening to and returning back. A couple other things there is where you can really start to drive that true platform approach of allowing the waitlist automation to then immediately take that cancellation that triggered at 2 a.m. And that first time when that office hour starts to open up and you allow for messages to go to patients at 7 a.m., 8 a.m., whatever it might be, the system can quickly pick up and start to generate out those messages to the patients during those respectful hours to allow for them to quickly grab that new opening and get in even sooner than they were previously scheduled. So, using that true integration and platform approach really starts to give that patient experience and balanced onus on that side. And then we start to drive to the staff experience. Now, when I as a patient reply that I'm coming into that appointment and confirm for it to do that integrated approach and tell that staff, hey, great news, Jenna's coming in. Again, speaking from experience, it doesn't matter how much you put, yes, patients are going to reply, yep, yeah, thumbs up, nope, no, thumbs down. And so, really making sure that we're enabling technology that can capture that natural language is incredibly important. But furthermore, too, for me as a patient, without having to enroll or register or download an application, I can really start to engage in giving your organization that meaningful information that you want from me before I come into the office. And so going through those HIPAA secure workflows and getting better at talking and typing, I as a patient start to be automatically populated with that checklist of information that you wanna capture for me. And it's very mobile-optimized, very easy to navigate for me as a patient. And so you're getting a very high completion, high patient adoption. In fact, it's pretty interesting as I start to navigate through these steps and update information and let it come back into the system. I'll share a quick data point here that is pretty interesting out there. Many organizations say, you know what, I've got a very older Medicare population or I'm a hand clinic and my patients are injured in their hand. And so they're not able to always just navigate all these forms and electronic workflows. What we see is that our worst offenders in utilization of technology are actually ages 17 to 25. Our best completion and success of demographics are 65 to 85. And in fact, we have data points of patients as old as 93 years old, self-scheduled an appointment at an orthopedic organization and she lived within a mile of the practice. That's definitely of the age generation that would drive to that office and talk to them at the front desk and schedule that appointment. But in fact, they're starting to leverage this technology because it truly is that seamless and easy. When I as a patient start to answer that clinically important information, it's really important for that data to come in as discreet into your provider's documentation so that your staff not having to print and manually enter it or take these signed consent forms and scan them into the appropriate section within your EHR system, allowing for the system to automatically populate them in real time and then pulling in that clinical information as the patient arrives. Leveraging other integrated technologies such as insurance information so that the patient can update it, we can run that real-time transaction and start to aggregate out the appropriate visit charge is incredibly important as well because it's giving your staff on the backend that source of truth of data that allows for the automation of that data to come in, allow for the patient, if they're delinquent or repeat offenders such as myself and not paying a patient balance, that I can quickly make those payments and allow them to come into the system with my card securely stored on file. By utilizing that integration, if you think back to my point that I had made in the beginning where patients need to feel secure in giving you that information, they need to feel and know that it's you as an organization. So is it your phone number messaging the patient? Is it your payment platform surfaced through a variety of different ways that patients access in their journey throughout your organization that makes it very secure and seamless and friendly and not different points of communication communicating out to that patient? And so as we really start to leverage out patient efficiency and that closed loop patient experience and giving that patient that quick, easy automated workflow of answering those questions before they come in, it then really starts to drive that true closed loop experience through their visit. Because as a provider, I could take advantage of leveraging a mobile application as an extension of the EHR and really starting to review and prep for my patients that are coming in for the day and really looking at the history that's within their chart, really starting to leverage any documents or images that may have come in that I as a patient had signed and was immediately within the chart already that I had just signed in front of you guys. And then can I start to drive that true ambient technology and workflow that will start to build and evolve into that structured soap note and send it with a click of the button to the EHR without that copy and paste. And so you can really start to see here in the evolution of that true closed loop experience and journey that we're able to really drive efficiency for patients and for practices so that your staff's not manually entering so that your patients aren't repeating themselves. And we're still really starting to drive that true integrated platform approach into that UX, that UI seamless experience for that balanced closed loop patient and practice experience. Now, a couple of key things that maybe a little bit when we could argue a little bias from my experience within running an organization and practice management but it's not just about clinical documentation and forms and data, it's about revenue, especially as payer reimbursement is significantly dropping out there in the market. And it's getting really hard for organizations to drive that clinical efficiency. And so it's one thing to leverage an ambient solution and really start to see that 40 to 50% documentation time decrease for patient providers. Is it a matter of, do I wanna see more patients during day? Do I wanna get home sooner and not have after hours documentation? Or do I wanna have more detailed documentation? And these technologies can drive all three of them and the style of utilization and how your providers and organizations adopt it is really where you'll start to see those efficiencies lead your organization towards more revenue back in the door. Now, a couple of key components that I like to talk about here when we look at technology and look at efficiencies is diving into a little bit of that claims process, right? And driving revenue into an organization. Specifically in the orthopedic space where payers gave me a really hard time was not having that access and visibility at the time, you know, admittedly, so it was a technology that I was using that didn't have integration like you just saw me launch into to have that claims visibility. But also too, I really had a hard time with managing, for example, claims attachment. We had a high population of workers' compensation, personal injury, and so really leveraging an integrated approach to where the solution can automatically say this is a workers' compensation claim folded on this dashboard. And allow for your staff to have the ability to identify that document, attach the record, and let the solution attach those records as that first pass claim. We know that auto comp, work comp, personal injury will all take those records. We also know that there is a growing list of commercial payers that are starting to take those records at first pass, and so create a rule of Blue Cross Blue Shield 29999 for that unlisted procedure code, have that sit on this dashboard automatically now to come back, and then your team have to resubmit on that denial or appeal to attach that operative report to justify that 29999 code. So a lot of really great efficiency drivers that, especially in my experience, I think are good food for thought to ensure that your organizations are really leveraging that technology to help maintain and drive revenue in, but again, your staff not having to hold up AR, take those denials, and then spend cumbersome time trying to figure out why the denial came in. A couple other key tools that are incredibly important that I know my organization spent a lot of time on not having access to technology like this at the time was denials and appeals management. Going out to those individual payer portals, trying to figure out what form they use. Do they take a paper? Do they require fax? Do they make me mailed in? Do they allow me to submit it electronically in their portal? Leveraging additional visibility with detailed data, such as that denial bucket and where your revenue is really being held up within an organization, but then being able to drill deep into that denial listing. Leveraging technology that a clearinghouse like this to where they are known to touch one and two patients out there in the industry. They've got significant data on these patients. And so being able to review these denials in detail and then take action on it can really drive to that appeal process. Without me having to drop out of this workflow, go to that separate payer portal, this technology is allowing for you to identify through that payer, what forms are available and then start to fill out that appeals process. Without me having to manually enter in that important claims information, I as an organization can have it automatically start to fill out and generate because that claim was submitted through here. They have a lot of the workflow. So I get to work by exception, driving that efficiency for the staff. And then I can start to save that draft and let the solution submit out that appeal and really follow up through there for that revenue into the organization. And so those are a couple key call-outs that I think are where a lot of organizations in the musculoskeletal space get hung up with efficiency and really making sure that revenue stays within the organization. But there are other differentiating solutions out there to really make sure that you're leveraging the right technology to give you that integrated approach, but most importantly, make sure that you're using your staff time most efficiently, giving them a good experience and hoping to drop down some of that staff retention issues that are out there. And then most importantly, reporting, leveraging technologies that really start to aggregate in what I call data lake or extract out into a true data environment that as it starts to take on that third-party data, but really start to show that trending and forecasting of your appointments and your no-shows and really not just financial and operational information, but clinical information. It's really important to have visibility into your encounter history, the encounter time spent on an encounter and provider productivity and utilization. Those are important data metrics that I know the market is really thriving and craving and looking towards. And so making sure that you're leveraging organizations to give you that true data visibility so that you can start to trend and forecast and drive that productivity within an organization. And one other kind of key call-out that I wanted to talk through a little bit today is that as you start to see these technologies evolve and move very fast in the market, as AI gets pushed harder and as patient experience really becomes the forefront of that evolution and reporting, but also just the user experience. And so it's not just making it look nice and feel nice, it's making it more efficient for a user. There's a lot of significant data out there that a mouse navigating to the right or to down or counting clicks, drops down efficiency that multiplies by minutes and hours. And so reorienting that UX and UI within a technology to drive your staff efficiency to not just give you that rounded corner or pretty background, but allow their mouse to navigate up and minimize clicks and drop that count and get that data right there at firsthand and not have to go dig for it, is really important to consider as the market starts to evolve and that true modernized UX UI refresh within the technology. And so some really exciting things amongst us and the reality is, is that AI is out there and obviously these photos were generated by AI. And if you look at the left one there, you stare at it a little long, it can be concerning on what you see within there, but what future do you want as an organization? What do your providers want and what do your patients want? And so really helping to leverage solutions that are integrated in that closed loop is incredibly important and giving that clean and seamless experience, knowing that we are going to have to battle with those payers on reimbursements and submissions. We are going to have to manage staff and their happiness and their livelihood and really what the cost is to employ them within an organization being at an all time high. And so as a couple of key points to consider as we close out at our time here, it's a very competitive landscape and efficiency is everything, not just your patients, but also your staff and ensuring that you have a balanced onus out there. Patients are in the driver's seat now more than ever. Their experience is non-negotiable and in conversations with organizations such as yourself, it's incredibly important to make sure that you're offering technology that's not making them go through barriers like usernames and passwords and downloading applications and clicking a bunch of links. And with that tighter reimbursement, it's making it much more urgent to maximize that revenue efficiency. So make sure that you're leveraging those tools that allow for your staff to not have to spend 10 minutes going to a payer portal, finding the claim, entering that manual information that could be very much automated and automatically filled in, allowing your staff to work by exception. I know that we're coming up on time here, but I really appreciate the opportunity to share a little bit of those market insights and where organizations such as yourself are really looking to navigate and drive that efficiency. And we encourage you to reach out at info at nextgen.com or www.nextgen.com if you have specific questions. And we will absolutely be back in touch if there are questions out there in the chat that we were unable to answer in our time today. Thank you so much, Jenna. This was a great presentation. As a reminder, this will be available in the AOE Learning Center. And so you'll be able to revisit this later if there's anything you wanted to dive deeper on or share with your staff. Again, definitely utilize that email for NextGen if you have follow-up questions for our presenters today. I want to thank everyone for their time, especially our presenters, to put together such a great webinar. And we will see everyone next time around. Thanks so much. Thank you so much. Happy holidays, everybody. You too, bye-bye. Bye-bye.

orthopedic practice efficiency

healthcare technology

AI in healthcare

patient experience

automated scheduling

staff retention