Medical Scribes Cut Costs

Medical scribes assist health care providers with medical documentation, thus freeing providers' time for clinical work. In 2015, Grand Valley State University (GVSU) partnered with Helix Scribe Solutions (HSS) to educate medical scribes with classroom and clinical training, including interprofessional education (IPE) created by the Midwest Interprofessional Education and Research Center. This study explored the impact of an academic scribe training program, including the effect of IPE on scribe student perceptions of teamwork and to determine the factor(s) associated with scribe documentation recording accuracy. From August 2016 to October 2018, 196 students consented to participate. Students were asked to complete the Interprofessional Education Perception Scale (IEPS) and Entry Level Interprofessional Questionnaire (ELIQ) tools before and after their educational program. Differences between overall pre- and post-questionnaires were significant (p<0.05). IEPS subscales, Perception of Need for Cooperation, Perception of Actual Cooperation, and Understanding Others' Values were significant (p<0.05). The ELIQ subscale Interprofessional Interaction showed significant positive scoring (p<0.05). Program evaluations showed the curriculum prepared the students to work in emergency department interprofessional teams. Logistic regression modeling indicated that students' grade point average was significant in predicting whether a scribe would have fewer deficiencies per chart on average as scribe employees.

Five years ago, Grand Valley's Scribe Academy started with a small cohort of students who learned to document patient care alongside emergency department health care providers.

The academy has since served as a jumpstart to the health care careers of more than 300 students, and continues to enroll cohorts monthly to work shifts at 17 area hospitals and medical offices. 

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Medical scribes increased Australian physicians’ productivity and shortened patients’ stay at emergency departments, according to a trial published in the BMJ.

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Helix Scribe Solutions Receives the MIPERC 2018 Community Award

Grand Rapids, MI, September 20, 2018.  Helix Scribe Solutions, a Grand Rapids company that trains people to work as medical scribes, earned the Community Award at the Midwest Interprofessional Practice, Education and Research Center (MIPERC) annual conference in September.  MIPERC is an interinstitutional infrastructure comprised of 25 organizational members across six states. 

Each year, MIPERC recognizes one community partner who has actively promoted interprofessional care in the local or regional community to improve the health of at-risk populations. Such an organization must contribute to the mentorship of interprofessional students in a collaborative process model and must be engaged in scholarship through research and documentation of their interprofessional practice and care initiatives.

The award recognizes Helix's commitment to supporting area college students’ career goals by training them in collaborative practice while assisting the health care provider with documentation in the patient medical record.  The clinical experience gained by the students helps them learn the different roles of team members and provides a lens as they prepare for their professional roles in graduate health programs. More than 100 students have had clinical experiences as scribes over the last three years.