Want to Know the Secrets of Great

Encounter Forms?

Sam Romeo, MD

Chris Hawley, MD

Romeo Medical Clinic – Tower Wellness Center

• Turlock, CA• Family Practice• Sports & Occ. Med• Ortho Surgery• ENT• Surgery Center• Restaurant, Spa + more!

Introduction• Learning from our mistakes.• Secrets of designing great

forms.• Form examples.

1st EMR - The Glorified Word Processor

Data blobs, data blobs….I can’t take it anymore!!

FORMS WHO SHALL NOT BE NAMED…

#1 - Non- Editable Forms #2 - Shared Free Forms

Custom forms

We can build anything you want!

Perfect! But what if I think I know what I’m doing, but really don’t?

Back to the

Drawing Board

Secret to Developing Great Forms

1. Understand Your Diverse Providers

2. Develop Guiding Principles

3. Follow Good Software Design Principles

4. Form design should match workflows.

Understanding Your Diverse Providers

Young Bucks

Veterans

Mid-Career

• Med School EMR

• Early Career EMR

• Mid-to-Late Career EMR

Narrative vs. Check list

Narrative Data Input & Output• CC: Headache• 45 year old female with 2

day history of headache associated with nausea, vomiting, and rashes. He denies fever, chills, vision change. This is aggravated by loud noise, light, and mother-in-law. Treatment tried includes ibuprofen, warm towel, and dark room.

Granular Clinical Checklist Data to Leverage EMR

• CC: Headache• Age: 45• Onset: Acute• Duration: 2 day• Reports: Nausea, vomiting,

rash.• Denies: Fever, chills, vision

changes.• Aggravated: Loud noise, light,

mother-in-law• Treatment: ibuprofen, warm

towel, and dark room

Develop Form Guiding Principles Before Developing Solutions

• Fast: – Eat lunch and done by 5 pm.

• Intuitive: – Data input mirrors provider brain/workflow.

• Thorough: – Capture granular data, orders, etc.

• Standardized: – Every form looks and works the same way.

Software Design Principles

• Granular Data In = Powerful Tool• Low Brain Energy for User

– Seamless experience– Left to Right Navigation– Separate Areas of Functionality– Don’t change the keys on the keyboard– Keep design practices consistent within each layer

• Minimize System Processing• Allow for expansion while maintaining

integration

4 Quadrant Design

MENUS SUB -

MENUS

REVIEWDATA

ENTRY

Physical Exam: Consistent Design

GRANULARIT

Y +

MODULARITY

“ Easy Buttons” Leverage Granularity

Seamless: Never Leave the FormSeamless Availability of Diagnostic Data

Integrated Assessment + Orders

Integrated Orders + Documentation

Counseling Instructions + G-Codes + Populate Obs Terms + CVS Population

Procedure Note + Charge Capture

“Meaningful” CVS Populate + Print

Summary to Developing Great Forms

1. Understand Your Diverse Providers

2. Develop Guiding Principles

3. Follow Software Design Principles

4. Form design should match workflows.

Photo References

Royalty free-photos used from Shutterstock for this presentation.

Limited use licenses available on request, except slide #2 (Tower Health & Wellness Center, Rights Owned) and slide #5 from HD Wallpapers: http://pichost.me/1906104/ also royalty free.