An Electronic Medical Consult vs Referral for Endocrinology
Livestrong.com: Here’s What the Numbers on Your Thyroid Test Mean
By Jessica Migala | Livestrong.com | September 4, 2021
Featuring insights from AristaMD’s contracted specialists Erin Okawa, MD, and Quang Nguyen, DO.
More than 12 percent of people in the U.S. will grapple with a thyroid condition at some point, and right now, about 20 million Americans have thyroid disease, according to the American Thyroid Association (ATA).
But thyroid disease can be sneaky, with symptoms — like fatigue and constipation — that are often easy to confuse for other problems. Because of that, the ATA points out, as much as 60 percent of those with a thyroid condition don’t know they have it.
The thyroid is a butterfly-shaped gland at the base of your neck. And while it may be small, it plays a big role in your overall health: It controls your metabolism, according to the Hormone Health Network, which is run by the Endocrine Society. That’s why a thyroid that’s overactive (hyperthyroid) or underactive (hypothyroid) is associated with symptoms like heat or cold intolerance, unintended weight loss or gain, sleep problems, gastrointestinal distress and more.
If you’re having symptoms that can be chalked up to a thyroid issue or have found a mass or lump in your neck at your thyroid gland, then your doctor (or you!) may request a thyroid test, says internal medicine physician Kristen Harvey, MD, ZoomCare Daily Care Practice Lead in Colorado and Idaho. Thyroid levels are measured by a standard blood test.
After your blood test, it’s natural to want to understand your results on your own or at least know what you’re looking at, especially if you’ve gotten your results through a health portal before your doctor has looked at them. We’ll break it down for you here, but you’ll want to have a conversation with your doctor as well.
“There is no cookbook approach for thyroid lab interpretation, but that’s what will happen if you try to interpret your lab on your own before talking to your doctor,” says Quang Nguyen, DO, medical director for Las Vegas Endocrinology and contracted specialist at AristaMD.
Electronic medical consults vs referrals for enhancing network retention
Patients are the lifeblood of any thriving healthcare network. Through the use of telehealth clinical services to promote effective referral management, these networks can dramatically enhance vital patient retention, which is key to the success of both fee-for-service (FFS) and value-based healthcare organizations.
Attracting new patients is always beneficial; however, this tends to be resource-intensive. That’s why electronic medical consult vs referral should be considered as an alternative. Existing patients typically account for the majority of appointments, making retention a key metric to monitor closely and integrate into organizational goals. When a patient seeks services outside of their established health care network, the network undergoes what is commonly known as “patient leakage,” a generally undesirable result for health systems, patients and payors.
In addition to clear loss of retained patient revenue, this causes difficulties in care coordination laddering up to implications within quality goals for both fee-for-service (FFS) and value-based organizations. Patient leakage is especially undesirable for Accountable Care Organizations (ACO), as these providers still bear the responsibility, financially speaking, for these patients’ outcomes. Patients may pay more out of pocket expenses for out-of-network care, which in turn may negatively impact appropriate follow-up care, outcomes and satisfaction. This begs the following question: how can a healthcare network better approach referral management in a manner that benefits all healthcare stakeholders?