A 2022 study found that full-time physicians spend 3.5 to 6 hours per day inside electronic health records (EHRs). Even if you're part-time, charting can slowly eat away at nights and weekends; but it doesn't have to.

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Your patients are unique, but you likely repeat a lot of the same language in your notes. That’s where a little automation comes in handy.

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Whether you call them “smart phrases,” “text snippets,” “macros” or “autotext”, chances are you've come across them when working with various electronic health records.

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Every time I summon a text snippet with a quick keyboard combination, I feel like I'm waving a magical medical-records-wand, conjuring up a spell to win at charting!

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As clinicians, we can all benefit from specialized snippets—especially mental health and ketamine clinics with specific workflows. With that in mind, we at Osmind built out an extensive library of over 60 snippets and counting.

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Let’s take a look at some of the benefits of using psychiatry smart phrases/snippets and  examples of how you can use them in your practice.

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First, the benefits of text snippets:

• Chart more efficiently

• Easily access key factual information about medical treatments and procedures without needing to memorize or look up statistics

• Have the best of both worlds: standard verbiage and templates with the ability to fully customize them or create some of your own from scratch

• Collaborate with colleagues in your practice or at other practices by sharing smart phrases

• Provide standardized psychoeducation to patients and families

• Streamline administrative work

• Increase compliance with clinical and medicolegal standards

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Psychiatric and ketamine Practices have unique workflows. Here are snippets to keep in mind and an example of each type from the Osmind library:

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1) Billing and Coding templates

When billing with Evaluation & Management codes, it’s crucial that the note support the level of medical decision making being coded for. That way, the snippet helps clinicians track and document process:

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2) Medication and Procedure information and consents

Keeping track of medication side effects risks can be hard, and writing elaborate titration schedules for medications can be tedious.

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This snippet for starting lamotrigine comes in handy when obtaining informed consent to start it:

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3) Note and note section templates for specialized types of visits

With an advanced snippet creator you can even make full note templates for specialized visits. Group therapy notes, for example, lend themselves well to this and you could customize the template for a particular type of group:

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4) Reporting of results on tests, rating scales or assessments

Explaining what test results mean in notes or to patients can be quite repetitive. Snippets can help with this:

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5) Documenting difficult decisions and risk

Given mental health clinicians are often in the position of conducting risk assessments around harm to self or others, having a structured way to approach and document these assessments can be quite impactful:

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6) Automating repetitive administrative tasks

How many times have you had to explain to patients about things like submitting “superbills” to their insurance for out-of-network reimbursement? A simple snippet sent via email, text or via a portal makes this so easy:

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Conclusion: 

As you can see, the possibilities and power of snippets for clinical and administrative workflows are endless for mental health and ketamine practices!

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If you're looking for more inspiration and to incorporate advanced snippets into your charting experience, don’t hesitate to get in touch with Osmind to learn more.