• Best Practice named as Business of the Year
• Bp Premier’s new release Jade
• Best Health App Update
• Bp Learning News
• Bp Partner Network
• Bp VIP.net Hints and Tips
• Conference Winners
• Bp Allied News
• Bp Allied Tips and Tricks
• Medicare Compliance Changes

Best Practice Software was announced as Business of the Year at the recent Bundaberg and District Chambers Business Excellence Awards. We also received the Manufacturer of the Year Award and its Manager, Marketing, Communications and Events, Trish Mears was awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award.

Our Chief Operating Officer Craig Hodges said the entire team was delighted with the result. “I’m so humbled to accept these awards in manufacturing and business excellence on behalf of a greater team of more than 150 people who make a tireless contribution each and every day” Craig said.

“More than recognition of our team’s efforts though, I think this award as a major local manufacturing business cements the Bundaberg region’s place as a regional innovation capital in Australia with a strong health-tech focus.  This regional economy has been built on sugar cane, small crops, distilled spirits, and light manufacturing, but we’ve proven its place as an IT and health-technology contributor to Australia and New Zealand.  It also shows that regional Australia has an important place in developing cutting-edge technology with global potential” Craig added.

Craig paid tribute to the vision and direction of the business’ founders, Dr Frank & Lorraine Pyefinch and his team of software design, development, sales, and support professionals located throughout Australasia.  “We have assembled a great team, who are entirely focussed on quality innovative health technology products and service, and their contribution underpins our award wins”.

For Australian users of Bp Premier

Bp Premier’s new release, Jade, is undergoing final testing and we think you’ll be pleased with the enhancements that will benefit many areas of your Practice.

Clinicians will have access to BMI calculators for patients older than 2 years old, including a percentile chart for children and teenagers. The previous Percentile Charts have been updated and enhanced to meet national recommendations. Asthma-related enhancements include updating the Asthma Action plan and Symptom sheet, along with a spirometry compliance check.  As patients now have the ability to opt out of and/or delete their My Health Record, their status will be regularly checked and the My Health Record button in the patient record will be deactivated if detected.

Practice Managers and Administrative staff will be able to view valuable patient appointment information from the Follow Up Inbox including location, patient name (if you include family members), type, length and other options.

Practices that operate across locations will be able to create customised location layouts. In the word processor, they will be able to create location letterheads and include location specific information such as ABN and address fields. The Location ABN information will display on invoices and receipts. Text from PDF documents can be copied and pasted into the word processor, as well. To assist with ePIP reporting, the Shared Health Summary report identifies the location of the clinician where it was uploaded. 

We’ll be notifying you as soon as final testing is completed and Bp Premier Jade is released.

For Australian users of Bp Premier

Bp Premier’s new patient App, Best Health App, is half way through Beta testing with patient downloads and clinic interactions increasing every day. 

Operations Manager at Millbank Medical Practice, Katrina, one of our first BETA sites, had this to say: “Our practice is excited to use Best Health App and now have many options to communication with our patients and looking forward to the new and innovated changes coming up with Best Practice”.

We’re looking forward to sharing it with all our Bp Premier customers as soon as we have completed the rigorous testing process.

For more information on how your Practice can benefit from using the Best Health app with your patients, visit the Best Health App website.

For Australian users of Bp Premier

Melbourne, we’re coming for you!

Whether you’re new to General Practice or need a refresher, coming along and speak to a Trainer who is well-versed in Patient Workflows and can help you reach your maximum potential as a user of Bp Premier.

We are currently taking registrations for all sessions in Melbourne starting on 30th July. Spots are limited and can’t be extended.

Please click here for more information or to register. Alternatively, call our Product Knowledge, Training and Deployment Team on 1300 40 1111 (pressing option 1 for Bp Premier and then option 3 for Training).

For Suppliers of Software that Integrates with Best Practice

Applications for the Bp Partner Network are now coming in, with a great response from the industry.

Bp’s Manager, Commercial & Customer Enablement, Jessica White said Best Practice has been delighted with the response. “We have received some top quality applications from some of Australia’s leading suppliers and are excited to bring them on board as part of the Bp Partner Network” Jessica White said. 

For those who haven’t received a copy of the application form or for those have any questions, please contact the Bp Partner Network Team. Email or telephone 1300 40 1111 (in Australia) or 0800 40 1111 (in New Zealand), selecting Option 4.

For New Zealand and Australian users of Bp VIP.net

Create a Letterhead Template

A separate letter head template should be created to apply to all your letter templates. All text in the letter template will move to allow room for the letterhead created in the header and footer of the letter head template.
1. Click Setup> Letter Templates
2. Click the New button
3. Click the Header and Footer button
4. In the Heads and Footers window, define which pages the Header and Footer will display

5. Create the header in the Header box.
            It is helpful to use tables within the header to format logos and text margins        

Click in the Footer box to create the footer of the template. Apply the letterhead to each letter templates in the Printing Options screen.

Printing Options for VIP.net Templates and Auto Templates

The printer settings enables the management of the template after creation.
6. Click Setup> Letter>Templates or Auto Templates
Select the template and click the Options button at the bottom of the screen.
The Printer Settings screen is displayed.
(NB: Some options are unavailable for an Autotemplate e.g. Rx cannot be Kept in File).

Team Bp recently showcased our software at two major conferences – Bp Allied at the APS Congress and Bp Premier at the AMA National Conference. 

Thanks to all those who entered our competition to win a $200 gift card.

Congratulations to Viviane our winner at the APS Congress and Dr Daniel, our winner at AMA National Conference.

For all users of Bp Allied

A program update to Bp Allied Version 6, Service Pack 4 was made available for download from 23rd May 2019 for your Practice.
Your download of this Update will help ensure your access to the most up to date program features and user functionality.

This update includes the following enhancements:
• Client Details: Resolved 'client data saving' issue which is caused when the user enters more data into a field than the permitted field length.
• MailChimp: MailChimp API updated so that it does not try to resubscribe clients that have been ''Cleaned'' by MailChimp and are considered invalid.

A full list of enhancements and bug fixes can be found on our Release Notes page here, or you can download the changes here.

For all users of Bp Allied

Remove a selected value from a drop down list

Sometimes, as software users, we fill in a drop down list by mistake. All too often, it’s not easy to figure out how to remove it once it’s entered. In Bp Allied it’s easy to remove a selection:
1. Click in the drop down field
2. Press Alt+Del on your keyboard
3. The value will clear from the drop down and the field should look blank.

Note: if a selection is mandatory, then this can’t be removed using this method.

Important changes were introduced on 1 July 2018 by the Department of Health (the department) that protects Australia’s health payments system through the prevention, identification and treatment of incorrect claiming, inappropriate practice and fraud by health care providers and suppliers.

One of the key changes for health professional will be the introduction of the Shared Debt Recovery Scheme (SDRS).

Shared Debt Recovery Scheme (SDRS)
On 1st July 2019 the Shared Debt Recovery Scheme (SDRS) will commence. The SDRS is intended to introduce a fairer approach to address organisational billing practises and will enable the department to hold an employing or contracting organisation responsible for a portion of any debts incurred as a result of incorrect Medicare claiming. 

This change recognises that there has been an increase in the role of practices, corporate entities and hospitals in the billing of MBS services on behalf of individual practitioners. It also highlights that both parties have a responsibility to ensure MBS claims are made correctly, in that:

• Medical practitioners have a responsibility to ensure claims made under their provider number meet the MBS requirements; and
• Medical Practices have a responsibility to ensure that medical practitioners within a practice are claiming MBS items correctly.

Prepare you Practice
Prior to 1st July 2019, Practices and health professional will need to review their Medicare billing practices and procedures to ensure that they are ready to comply with the changes. Ensure your procedures are documented, reviewed with your team and any additional training provided to your team.

Billing Procedures
If your doctors do not enter their own billing items when finalising a visit we recommend that you encourage them to do so instead of informing your Reception team verbally which items to bill.  If this is not possible, then train your doctors to use the ‘notes to reception’ text box on the ‘Finalise Visit’ window. This will generate a record of the request, which is linked to the appointment and can be queried on.

Should there be any changes to the initial MBS item/s requested by the doctor, you may wish to document the changes using patient Contact Notes within the Appointment Book.
 Highlight patient in Appointment Book > right-click and select Record Note > Add > select Contact reason > select Contact method: face-to-face or email > select Contact with: Not specified > record notes > select Message status: Successful.
 Practices may also wish to add a custom Contact Note Reasons (Configuration > List tab) such as Billing Requests or Billing Corrections to be used for these contact notes.

Bp Premier Changes

Support

In the event your Practice is audited, our Software Support team will be able to provide you with a script that will show the Items to Bill and Notes to Reception from the Finalise visit screen and any Appointment related contact notes for a specific or range of Invoice numbers.

Contact Notes

To assist with creating accurate Contact Notes, in a future version Bp Premier will have some additional ‘Contact with’ options such as Clinician, Practice Staff and External.

Need more information?
• Visit the Department of Health
www.health.gov.au/health-compliance
Compliance education for health professionals
• Email compliance.stakeholder@health.gov.au

Other useful resources
• Australian Medical Association
Medicare Compliance: What providers need to know
• Avant Mutual
https://www.avant.org.au/news/reforms-to-medicare-compliance/
• Bartier Perry Lawyers
Medicare billing and the new Shared Debt Recovery Scheme: What you need to know!