Developing and Implementing Health Information Management Document Imaging Productivity Standards: A Case Study from an Acute Care Community Hospital.

As health information management (HIM) shifts from paper-based medical records to electronic medical documentation, HIM professionals must appropriately manage their resources to produce higher results for their organization's operational and financial indicators. This case study highlights the experience of the HIM department in a small Florida community hospital in analyzing existing productivity standards and developing new standards with the purpose of improving the document imaging process. The research produced new productivity standards that more accurately represent the time HIM technicians spend performing their everyday tasks. The data collected during this period indicate that the average HIM technician was prepping 844 images an hour, scanning 601 images an hour, and indexing 482 images an hour. While a trend in productivity cannot be identified because different types of data were collected, the department's standards are now based on more consistently measurable output. The data collected during this study were used to manage the continuously changing workflow processes; improve the staff's knowledge, skills, and abilities; and identify potential areas of process improvement.