Anyone use an efax service that integrates with office?

[AustinInDallas]

I need to send out new hippa contracts to all my clients. Is there a way to use something like mail merge and send them to all of them?

I need to have them personalized, so I made a excel with all of their information including fax number. Ill mail merge them with the document (ie: Dear [Dr. Name],) then I want them all to automatically send

 

[slatr]

www.xmpie.com

This may be overkill for what you need, but it was the first thing that came to mind.

I can give you a sales reps number if you want to talk to them.

 

[AustinInDallas]

www.xmpie.com

This may be overkill for what you need, but it was the first thing that came to mind.

I can give you a sales reps number if you want to talk to them.

i feel like thats not what im looking for...

 

[AustinInDallas]

anyone ever use interfax?
http://www.interfax.net/en/fax-from-ms-office

i did the trial of efax, not exactly what i want..

 

[trishg]

You must be careful using any form of email when dealing with patient information. Email is not secure and transmission of PHI through unsecured email would be considered a breach.

Have you looked at Sfax. The website is www.sfaxme.com
This is a HIPAA compliant fax solution.
You can upload your patient contact data into the Fax contacts list and then fax the information securely to your patients.

 

[mcveigh]

how can any fax solution be HIPAA compliant??

it's OK to use a fax......it's NOT OK to have any PHI goto the wrong fax number which is easy to do. and requires reporting.
I work in a hospital and had to sit through a 2 hour meeting on HIPAA compliance last night.

I'm not a lawyer and depending of the number of clients it may be worth it to consult with a lawyer that knows HIPAA

 

[orenero]

You must be careful using any form of email when dealing with patient information. Email is not secure and transmission of PHI through unsecured email would be considered a breach.

Have you looked at Sfax. The website is www.sfaxme.com
This is a HIPAA compliant fax solution.
You can upload your patient contact data into the Fax contacts list and then fax the information securely to your patients.

+1 I personally use this and they are great. I have the personal one for 24 a year!!! Can't beat that!!!

http://www.sfaxme.com/plans-pricing/

The Freedom plan..

 

[AustinInDallas]

You must be careful using any form of email when dealing with patient information. Email is not secure and transmission of PHI through unsecured email would be considered a breach.

Have you looked at Sfax. The website is www.sfaxme.com
This is a HIPAA compliant fax solution.
You can upload your patient contact data into the Fax contacts list and then fax the information securely to your patients.

we are not sending patient info, just changes in hippa regulations that we have to inform our clients about.

So hippa compliance isnt a problem for this problem, just want to send out a lot of faxes without sending them all out one at a time from a fax machine

 

[slatr]

i feel like thats not what im looking for...

XMPIE can do variable data documents and send on your behalf, but it would probably not be cost effective.

I am about to evaluate this product for basic faxing for a physician's office.

It seems it may be EHR/EMR centric, so it might not be for you. There is a 15 day trial.

http://updox.com/

 

[AustinInDallas]

XMPIE can do variable data documents and send on your behalf, but it would probably not be cost effective.

I am about to evaluate this product for basic faxing for a physician's office.

It seems it may be EHR/EMR centric, so it might not be for you. There is a 15 day trial.

http://updox.com/

We have all that is stuff in place for generating diagnostic reports from my radiologists.

I just want to type up a document in word, use mail merge from an excel spread sheet, and have some sort of one click to fax

 

[slatr]

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/create-and-distribute-merged-faxes-HP003081174.aspx

These steps require you to use Outlook, Word and of course a fax modem.

 

[seepy83]

how can any fax solution be HIPAA compliant??

it's OK to use a fax......it's NOT OK to have any PHI goto the wrong fax number which is easy to do. and requires reporting.
I work in a hospital and had to sit through a 2 hour meeting on HIPAA compliance last night.

I'm not a lawyer and depending of the number of clients it may be worth it to consult with a lawyer that knows HIPAA

It may sound crazy, but it is widely agreed upon that fax is a HIPAA compliant medium for transmitting information. The lawyers agree on this.

Yes, you have the potential problem of the unintended recipient picking it up from the fax machine that you send it to. But as far as transmitting PHI, it is compliant.

My experience has been that the lawyers just tell you to include something in the cover letter that basically says (forgive me, I'm not going to go find the exact legalese) "This fax contains PHI. If you are not the intended recipient then you must call {Company} at {Company Phone Number} and mail the original document back to {Company} at {Insert Mailing Address Here}."

IANAL, but that has been my experience working in the health insurance claims industry.

 

[AustinInDallas]

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/word-help/create-and-distribute-merged-faxes-HP003081174.aspx

These steps require you to use Outlook, Word and of course a fax modem.

if i dont want to use a fax modem, can i do it with electronic fax?

 

[slatr]

I haven't tested the steps on that link.

It looks like these guys integrate with office, so they may be viable for hosted faxing.

http://www.biscom.com/products/fax-hosting/editions.htm

They would theoretically be the last step in your process. They should be able to replace the modem.

 

[lxskllr]

It may sound crazy, but it is widely agreed upon that fax is a HIPAA compliant medium for transmitting information. The lawyers agree on this.

Yes, you have the potential problem of the unintended recipient picking it up from the fax machine that you send it to. But as far as transmitting PHI, it is compliant.

My experience has been that the lawyers just tell you to include something in the cover letter that basically says (forgive me, I'm not going to go find the exact legalese) "This fax contains PHI. If you are not the intended recipient then you must call {Company} at {Company Phone Number} and mail the original document back to {Company} at {Insert Mailing Address Here}."

IANAL, but that has been my experience working in the health insurance claims industry.

There should be a competency test when creating, voting on, or interpreting law as it pertains to technology. Regardless of what anyone says, fax isn't in any way secure.

 

[LeoW]

I filtered this page to show HIPAA compliant online fax services that integrate with MS Office.

What I would do is create a mail merge (as you suggested) to automatically create and send the emails that you want to send. I don't think you can add attachments when doing a mail merge, so you'll need to put the contract in the body of the email (most online fax services treat the body of the email as a cover page, so I'm thinking this could be ok).

Let me know how it goes.