by Rachna Bagdi on January 7, 2025
There’s no denying that in recent years, mental health needs have been continuously evolving and increasing across populations. A Kaiser and CNN study found that half of young people report feeling frequently anxious, more than half of all people say they or a family member have recently experienced a mental health emergency, and a staggering 90% of the public believe we’re in a widespread mental health crisis.
To meet mental health needs clinically without compounding the already-existing pressure put on providers requires having strong mental health practice management software that enables smooth workflows, seamless data access, client engagement and empowerment, and more increasingly essential capabilities.
The need for this administrative foundation is part of the reason why the market for mental health software like electronic health records (EHRs) is projected to grow to $14.6 billion by 2033, as practices increasingly adopt technologies to enhance the quality of their care delivery and efficiency of their operations.
5 Ways an EHR Can Help Solve Operational Challenges
Here’s a look at the power of robust mental health practice management software — and how it can help providers meet administrative and clinical challenges in mental health care on the way to better overall performance.
1. Transforming Paper-Based Systems Into Advanced Digital Workflows
According to a 2024 Gartner study, nearly one-third of mental health clinics still use manual systems to organize schedules, take session notes, track client data, and manage billing cycles. As practices scale, these manual methods become increasingly untenable, often leading to errors, inefficiencies, and inaccurate assessments that hinder effective care delivery.
Due to the additional time and effort they take to operate, outdated paper-based systems make it challenging for clinicians to address urgent client needs and monitor individuals’ progress. Additionally, complying with shifting regulations becomes more difficult, which can be costly for clinics.
Advanced mental health practice management software, like an electronic health records system (EHR), can introduce automation into these areas to allow providers and staff to work at the top of their game while also easing provider workloads, enabling personnel to spend more and better quality time with clients.
Strong behavioral health EHRs offer customizable dashboards that empower clinic staff to access real-time client data through intuitive visualizations. Pre-designed, evidence-based workflows automate task delegation, boosting a clinic’s overall productivity while reducing the need for manual interventions. The right systems also support clinical decision-making by using bespoke risk scoring to flag clients at higher risk for emergencies in real-time.
By shifting outdated and time-consuming manual processes to an advanced digital platform, mental health providers can streamline their work, save time, reduce costs, and ultimately deliver better care.
2. Beating Burnout and the Shortage of Mental Health Providers
As mental health needs increase, clinics face a widespread shortage of mental health providers and clinician burnout. The American Psychological Association (APA)found that in 2022, nearly half 46% of providers reported feeling unable to meet demand, an increase from 30% in 2020. Nearly half reported feeling burnt out as well.
The impact of the shortage of mental health providers — and the high rates of burnout among existing providers — have a serious impact on clients. About 38% of clinics have a waitlist, says the APA, and nearly half of the 59 million U.S. adults experiencing mental illness didn’t receive treatment in 2023, reports the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis.
Advanced mental health practice management software is particularly helpful for the 120-plus million people living in provider shortage areas, as it helps give individuals access to healthcare they might otherwise lack. Streamlined telehealth capabilities, for example, enable people to set and manage their own appointments and reach providers no matter where they live.
At the same time, client empowerment tools — such as a secure, intuitive client portal — allow clients to pay bills, schedule visits, learn about diagnoses, communicate with providers, and review documentation on their own. This not only fosters more client ownership over their care plan, but it also reduces provider and staff workloads considerably, providing much-needed relief for overworked clinicians.
3. Meeting Complex and Ever-Changing Regulatory Requirements
Keeping pace with changing compliance regulations doesn’t just burden staff with time-consuming tasks. It can also be costly for practices as well, with inpatient psychiatric facilities spending around $1.7 billion annually on Medicare compliance alone. In short, meeting local and federal regulations — especially when they shift — can be burdensome for most behavioral health clinics.
Robust mental health practice management software offers a central repository of compliance tasks, deadlines, and role assignments to help automate regulatory-related workflows and enable clinics to avoid non-compliance fines. The platform organizes deadlines and pushes regulatory changes to the clinic’s dashboard toensure providers and staff never miss a beat.
4. Enhancing Mental Health Documentation Procedures
A Nuance study of about 1,000 providers found some startling data around documentation demands in healthcare: Providers are spending about 13.5 hours per week on clinical documentation, a figure that’s increased by 25% since 2015.
Manual mental health documentation is time-consuming, and it’s difficult for providers to derive key insights from their notes through manual processes. Mental health practice management software backed by artificial intelligence (AI), however, can help solve this issue. Mental health documentation AI solutions are available that can automatically record spoken sessions and then provide summaries for progress notes. Some advanced AI tools even scan those notes to find hard-to-spot symptoms to aid in the diagnosis and treatment processes.
5. Increasing the Efficacy of Revenue Cycle Management
Outdated revenue cycle and billing management can often result in increased claim denials, payment delays, significant strain on staff, and lost revenue. Billing and coding errors can likewise impact an organization’s ability to manage and plan for payments and revenue effectively.
But with the right mental health practice management software, clinics can access embedded revenue cycle management tools to streamline and increase the accuracy of billing processes. With this technology, staff can track clients by payer type and customize claim rules to avoid costly mistakes, among numerous other benefits that strengthen financial performance.
An All-in-One Mental Health Solution to Boost Productivity Care Delivery
For mental health organizations, client-facing success often depends on efficient backend operations. With Core Solutions’ Cx360 system, practices can integrate all the technologies they need to streamline their processes within one central platform to address the many challenges in mental health care. The Cx360 platform offers must-have features including:
- Powerful, intuitive, and customizable dashboards
- Access to real-time client and operational data
- AI-powered tools to enhance documentation, symptom tracking, and more
- Embedded revenue cycle management solution
Want to see what the Cx360 platform will do for your practice? Contact us to learn more.
