Dr. Warren's Blog

Patient Portal Is Now Open!

jwarrenod — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 19:09:52 +0000

I’m very proud to announce that our Patient Portal is now open and ready for use by our patients. I’m proud as a health care provider as well as a founder of the company that provides the software solution that I use to manage my office, RevolutionEHR.

My patients now have access to a wide range of information about themselves, their visits, upcoming appointments and orders. We will be adding more features in the coming months. First will be the ability to update your personal health history before your next appointment. Next will be the ability to reschedule and schedule appointments.

My goal is to empower my patients to use their health care record as part of their entire health care process. This first version of our patient portal is just the beginning.

To be given access to your PHR data, just call the office and we will provide you with your user name and password. The website address for the PHR is www.revolutionphr.com

Dr. Warren

www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

Our YouTube Channel

jwarrenod — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 15:24:54 +0000

I’ve put some videos up on our YouTube channel. They are a mix of information about my practice and my approach to eye care as well as informational videos about topics such as Dry Eye and other ocular health and vision conditions. You can view the channel by following this link. I hope that you find these videos interesting. I’ve put a couple of example videos in this blog post.

Dr. Warren

www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

Its An Annual Event Right Here In Racine!

jwarrenod — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 18:55:41 +0000

I blogged on this event last year, and its just as interesting this year too. The annual “Big Chill” ice/snow carving competition in Monument Square here in Racine. There were some really great sculptures this year. If you didn’t get a chance to check them out today, stop on down before they melt away……

Dr. Warren

www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

I Value Your Time!

jwarrenod — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 20:51:40 +0000

One of my pet peeves is showing up for an appointment and having to wait around for the person that I’m supposed to meet with. Whether its one of my doctors, an attorney, my accountant or anyone else, being more than a few minutes late really bugs me. My staff feels the same way, and if I happen to fall more than 3-4 minutes behind with my schedule in my office, it drives the staff nuts!

As I look at setting up my schedule in the office, I take several things into account:

What type of appointment is being booked at what time
What type of testing we will typically do for each type of appointment
When I expect myself or the appropriate staff member to be available to work with the patient
When other patients should be finished with their appointments, freeing myself or my staff members up to work with other patients

The staff and I are very proud of how punctual we tend to be. Its rare for me to fall more than 10 minutes behind barring a very rare and unusual occurrence. We intentionally leave “holes” in my schedule to allow us to catch up if we do fall just a few minutes behind, and we have the exam process quite well choreographed. For this reason, if a patient is running quite a bit late, we will make every effort to see them on the day of their appointment, however, they may end up having to wait for other patients who were on or close to on time for their appointment. Its not fair to patients who are on time to have to wait for those who weren’t!

We have recently changed our exam process a bit, moving the instillation of the dilating drops to a point that is earlier in the exam process (and many times using a milder dilating drop too!). This allows me to complete a thorough exam without the patient having to sit in the lobby for 10-15 minutes to allow the drops to dilate the pupils. Patients have been very happy with this change as it spares them all of the time sitting around without sacrificing the quality of their exam.

Between this new exam process and the ethnology that I have decided to implement in my practice, things tend to run very smoothly, while still allowing for quite a bit of “socialization” between myself and my patients. One of the things that I enjoy most about being an eye doctor is spending a few minutes getting to know my patients, and catching up with patients that I may have been caring for for close to 20 years (am I really that old?).

While there may be the odd time that I run behind, you can rest assured that I’m just as annoyed as you are if I’m late getting to your appointment! I truly value your time more than mine and am committed to keeping an onetime record that most other health care providers and professionals can only dream of!

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

Did You Know………?

jwarrenod — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:14:13 +0000

That we can now send many different types of notices to our patients electronically. We can now send email and/or text messages for the following:

Appointment notifications when a new appointment is made
- This notification includes a link to add the appointment to your electronic schedule with 1 mouse click.
Appointment confirmations which allow you to confirm your attendance at the appointment with a single mouse click.
- You can also request a different appointment date and/or time if your schedule has changed
- Soon you will be able to reschedule your appointment right from the email, but not quite yet
Notifications when your eye glasses are ready to be picked up
Notifications about any urgent changes to our office status (in the event that we needed to close early or for the entire day due to weather for example)

As you can see, we now have many ways to communicate with our patients. But we need to have your correct email and/or cell phone number to provide this service to you. If you would like us to update your information, just send an email to Erin and she will update your information!

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

“Do You Take My Insurance?”

jwarrenod — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 02:16:33 +0000

We hear this question many times per week when potential new patients call the office, or when local employers change their employees’ insurance benefits. There are two types of plans that we deal with in my office; “Routine Vision Care Plans” such as Vision Service Plan and EyeMed and “Major Medical Plans” such as Medicare, UMR, United Health Care etc. Let me explain how the two are different, and how they sometimes overlap a bit.

A Routine Vision Care Plan provides pre-paid and/or discounted fees for routine eye examinations, contact lenses and eye wear. These plans don’t cover medical eye care services such as treating an eye infectoin.

A Major Medical Insurance Plan covers medical eye care such as treating an eye infection, or diagnosing, treating and monitoring Glaucoma. Some major medical plans do provide a “wellness eye exam benefit” similar to providing a routine physical every year or two. We are “in network” or “panel providers” for the vast majority of the major medical plans in our area. There are some of these plans that are “closed panel” meaning that they aren’t accepting new providers, but most will allow providers to join their panel as long as the provider is willing to accept their fee schedule for payment for services.

There are several “Routine Vision Care Plans” that are active in our area. We are in network providers for two of them, Vision Service Plan (VSP for short) and EyeMed. These are the only two of these type of plans that to date are reasonable to administer and with acceptable reimbursement for services and eye wear/contact lenses. Two other plans, Spectera and Davis Vision are either too cumbersome to administer or don’t provide adequate payment for services and materials.

Insurance companies such as United Health Care have hundreds of different plans and programs that a patient may be covered by. There is no way for an office to know which of these programs each patient has or whether we are considered in network or out of network for that program. The simplest way to find out if we are in network is to call your insurance company at the number on the back of the ID card. I wish that there were a simpler way for patients and my staff to know this, but there really is not.

If you would like my staff to investigate becoming network providers for any major medical or vision care plans, just give us a call or send us an email. To help local employers provide a vision care benefit to their employees, I have also set up a discount eye care program which provides employees and their families with a simple to understand and administer program. If you would like to learn more about this program, please email Erin at erin@warreneyecarecenter.com for more information.

This complex question doesn’t have a simple or clear cut answer, but we do our best to work with our patients and potential new patients to simplify the process.

Dr. Warren

Merry Christmas, Happy Chanukah and Happy New Year!

jwarrenod — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 16:28:20 +0000

From all of us at Warren Eye Care. Thanks for a great year. We’re looking forward to many more to come.

As you read in my previous blog post, we will have slightly adjusted hours for the Christmas/New Year’s period. As always, I am available after hours for any emergency eye care that may be needed.

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

Holiday Hours

jwarrenod — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 01:33:02 +0000

We will be closed on December 23rd and will reopen on the 26th at 9:00 am. We will have normal hours on the 30th and January 2nd.

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Exciting Times!

jwarrenod — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 16:52:25 +0000

Over the last 19 years that I’ve practiced in Racine, I’ve been fortunate enough to work with several talented doctors. Just over three years ago, Dr. Ron Allen moved his practice into my office. This arrangement allowed us to share the resources in my practice to the benefit of our patients and ourselves. Effective next Tuesday, Dr. Allen will no longer be practicing general ophthalmology, he will be limiting his practice to LASIK and cataract surgery through LASIK Plus.

I will be taking over his practice and his patient records. He will still be available for surgical consults and surgery (cataract surgeries will happen in Racine, LASIK in Brookfield). I will provide the pre and post operative care for patients who undergo surgery with Dr. Allen, something that I’ve been doing for the last two decades.

This means that his patients will still be seen in my office, all of their medical record information, exam data and special testing data will still be in my office and available to me. Patients of Dr. Allen’s will also have access to me on more days per week as I am in the office five days per week.

While Dr. Allen will be missed, I am looking forward to taking care of his patients, many of whom I’ve cared for at one point or another when he and I practiced together.

If any patients have questions or concerns about the practice transition, our Patient Advocate Erin is available via email at erin@warreneyecarecenter.com or by phone at 262-664-5705.

Patients who have appointments with Dr. Allen will be seen by me at the same day and time. If for some reason we need to reschedule they appointment, Erin will be calling them to facilitate this change.

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment

End Of The Year…….

jwarrenod — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 17:47:03 +0000

Every year the month of November seems to slip by far too quickly and the next thing we know its December. The snow has started flying and it won’t be long until we’re moving into 2012.

Remember that if you have a Flexible Savings Account or Medical Savings Account you can use those funds for eyeglasses, contact lenses and/or exam and professional fees. We’re very used to working with these accounts with our patients so just ask us for help and we’ll make sure that you have all of the receipts and paper work that you may need.

If you have vision care plan benefits that are on a calendar year cycle, be sure to use them by the end of the year as you can’t carry them forward for next year. Our evening appointments aren’t totally booked for the rest of the year, but they’re starting to fill up quickly. If you want to be seen in one of our “after work” time slots, you can request an appointment from this link or give us a call at (262) 752-2020 to do so.

Dr. Warren
www.warreneyecarecenter.com

Request An Appointment