Document Management Technology Improves Efficiency, Accessibility

Converting paper files to electronic documents freed up staff time and office space for mental healthcare provider Oaklawn, allowing it to offer better service to its clients.

The stacks of paper and rows of filing cabinets crammed with important financial information left little office space for workers at Oaklawn, an inpatient, residential, and outpatient mental health hospital in Goshen, IN. The lack of storage and a desire to be more efficient forced the center to reevaluate how it was doing business and particularly how it was managing its patient financial records. From healthcare forms and insurance cards, patient bills to privacy forms – Oaklawn needed to find a better way to store and access the everyday documents of its business.

During the summer of 2004, the center decided to stop outsourcing its patient financial services and create an in-house department to manage its day-to-day financial processes. At the same time, Oaklawn realized that the solution for its space needs and desire for greater efficiency rested with document management technology. Beth Arter was hired that fall to help guide the learning process at Oaklawn as its director of patient financial services. "We wanted to create efficiencies," Arter says of Oaklawn's motivation. "Document management allows our patient financial services staff to more easily do the research it needs to do."