Shaffer
07-26-02, 09:31 AM
Last November, officials from naval hospitals at Camp Lejeune and Cherry
Point announced routine appointments could be made over the Internet via the
Tricare Online program.
They were test pilots, so to speak - the first Navy hospitals on the East
Coast to put the effort in place. They set an enrollment goal of 3,000 by
Christmas.
That was an ambitious figure put out of reach by the war on terrorism and
further slowed when hospital efforts were needed in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to
take care of Taliban and al-Qaida detainees.
But Tricare Online hit its mark this month, and Navy Capt. Christopher L.
Laurent, director of Primary Services for Camp Lejeune Naval Hospital, said
the numbers should swell once new equipment is in place this fall. Use will
also increase when customers find out that local appointments can often be
found online after customers are told by telephone that no times are
available.
To access the system, a user must register with a name and password. They
are then asked to fill out an information page with the sponsor's name and
social security number. When a patron logs into the system for the second
and subsequent times, they are immediately asked if they would like to
schedule an appointment with their primary care provider.
The system displays a calendar and allows the patient to schedule an
appointment up to six weeks in advance using a computer mouse to point and
click on the desired date. Only two appointments may be booked per month.
Appointments may be canceled online at any time.
"On e-health, there are (options for) routine and established appointments,"
Laurent said. "There is no such thing as a routine appointment so our
beneficiaries need to access only the established ones."
Patients can see a larger number of possible appointments and gain greater
access to the local military medical system even when representatives on the
Tricare hotline number cannot be of service, Laurent said.
Users are encouraged to choose a physician, physician assistant or a nurse
practitioner as their preferred health care provider under the concept of
the traditional family doctor.
Patients are directed to www.tricareonline.com, where the system checks
their benefits with the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System. The
software then walks someone with little or no computer skills through the
process of building their own Web page by answering yes and no to questions
with the click of a mouse.
Representatives from more than 100 Army, Air Force and Navy hospitals are
providing the service and many of them call local military medical providers
for their advice.
The Naval Hospital currently has about 6 percent of its patient population
enrolled and hopes to increase that number to 10 percent this fall.
"Three thousand people is roughly 4 percent of our population enrolled and
only 6 percent of those people are using it," Laurent said. "On any given
day we schedule between 300 and 400 appointments, and approximately 180
people a month are using (Tricare Online)."
Representatives are also working toward "advanced access" in which acute
patients could be seen within 24 hours and all other patients within a week.
That would cut the current waiting time in half.
Those who forget their password can also get help at Camp Lejeune through
Chuck Klug in Information Resource Management. Due to privacy requirements,
patients must visit him in room E132 at the main hospital to reset their
account. For other inquiries he can be reached at cdklug@nc.hcl.
med.navy.mil
"It doesn't cost a dime, and we have the technical support personnel here at
the Naval Hospital to reset passwords or walk patients through problems,"
Laurent said.
Contact Eric Steinkopff at estein kopff@jdnews.com or at 353-1171, Ext. 236.
Point announced routine appointments could be made over the Internet via the
Tricare Online program.
They were test pilots, so to speak - the first Navy hospitals on the East
Coast to put the effort in place. They set an enrollment goal of 3,000 by
Christmas.
That was an ambitious figure put out of reach by the war on terrorism and
further slowed when hospital efforts were needed in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to
take care of Taliban and al-Qaida detainees.
But Tricare Online hit its mark this month, and Navy Capt. Christopher L.
Laurent, director of Primary Services for Camp Lejeune Naval Hospital, said
the numbers should swell once new equipment is in place this fall. Use will
also increase when customers find out that local appointments can often be
found online after customers are told by telephone that no times are
available.
To access the system, a user must register with a name and password. They
are then asked to fill out an information page with the sponsor's name and
social security number. When a patron logs into the system for the second
and subsequent times, they are immediately asked if they would like to
schedule an appointment with their primary care provider.
The system displays a calendar and allows the patient to schedule an
appointment up to six weeks in advance using a computer mouse to point and
click on the desired date. Only two appointments may be booked per month.
Appointments may be canceled online at any time.
"On e-health, there are (options for) routine and established appointments,"
Laurent said. "There is no such thing as a routine appointment so our
beneficiaries need to access only the established ones."
Patients can see a larger number of possible appointments and gain greater
access to the local military medical system even when representatives on the
Tricare hotline number cannot be of service, Laurent said.
Users are encouraged to choose a physician, physician assistant or a nurse
practitioner as their preferred health care provider under the concept of
the traditional family doctor.
Patients are directed to www.tricareonline.com, where the system checks
their benefits with the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System. The
software then walks someone with little or no computer skills through the
process of building their own Web page by answering yes and no to questions
with the click of a mouse.
Representatives from more than 100 Army, Air Force and Navy hospitals are
providing the service and many of them call local military medical providers
for their advice.
The Naval Hospital currently has about 6 percent of its patient population
enrolled and hopes to increase that number to 10 percent this fall.
"Three thousand people is roughly 4 percent of our population enrolled and
only 6 percent of those people are using it," Laurent said. "On any given
day we schedule between 300 and 400 appointments, and approximately 180
people a month are using (Tricare Online)."
Representatives are also working toward "advanced access" in which acute
patients could be seen within 24 hours and all other patients within a week.
That would cut the current waiting time in half.
Those who forget their password can also get help at Camp Lejeune through
Chuck Klug in Information Resource Management. Due to privacy requirements,
patients must visit him in room E132 at the main hospital to reset their
account. For other inquiries he can be reached at cdklug@nc.hcl.
med.navy.mil
"It doesn't cost a dime, and we have the technical support personnel here at
the Naval Hospital to reset passwords or walk patients through problems,"
Laurent said.
Contact Eric Steinkopff at estein kopff@jdnews.com or at 353-1171, Ext. 236.