by Jennifer Gillespie, Assistant Editor

StartSmart provides a one-stop shop approach to respiratory therapy departments looking to expand into diagnostic sleep programs.  

“We offer a diagnostic sleep program where facilities can enhance their respiratory therapy department to bring on new employees and retain old ones,” says an official company spokesperson from Breathing Disorders Services, Inc. (BDS) and StartSmart Solutions, Inc., its subsidiary.  By doing so, he can help clients to increase revenue.  

an official spokesperson accepted a position as president of a new venture in 1992, with the vision of providing modular/contractual Polysomnography to organizations and communities that did not offer these services.  He purchased the contracts from this company and formed BDS in April 1995.  As demand grew, BDS added respiratory and home medical equipment to its services.  The executive staff developed StartSmart Solutions as a subsidiary company.  

EDUCATION

StartSmart provides a two-week “Basics of Polysomnography” training program for contractual customers.  A selected respiratory therapist must attend the program prior to conducting sleep studies.  “We bring them to Oklahoma City for a week, and then we train for another week at the therapist’s institution,” an official spokesperson explains.

A StartSmart online education program requires the respiratory therapist who is actually conducting the studies to perform online education or a continuing education course every other month.  BDS also offers online courses for cardiac rehabilitation, pulmonary rehabilitation, oxygen therapy and IPPV, nasal CPAP and bilevel ventilation.

All StartSmart employees must take the sleep and respiratory course and complete take-home test monthly.  “Not only do we require our employees to take these course, but it’s mandatory that our contractual customers takes these tests as well for continued quality improvement in a performance plan,” an official spokesperson says.

STARTUP PACKAGE
In addition to training, the program incorporates a complete startup package, including:

• Policies and procedures that follow the Joint Commission of Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations guidelines.
• Job descriptions that outline how to monitor employees’ performance, conduct appraisals and set long-term objectives and short-term objectives.
• Instructions on how to bill for studies and collect reimbursement.
• Marketing platforms that offer brochures for advertising internally and externally.

“We’re basically preparing these people for the future,” an official spokesperson says.  “We provide all the forms and questionnaires – from the very beginning to the very end of opening up a lab – everything is covered in the startup package.”  

StartSmart also offers a scoring and analysis service, where customers can send the sleep study data via the Internet either during a recording or shortly thereafter.  Then registered sleep technologists stage and score the data, and physicians boarded in sleep medicine interpret the recordings.  They return the data, interpretation and recommendation to the facility within 24 hours.
 
BDS maintains a “relationship first” policy to ensure customer satisfaction, an official spokesperson says.  Quality assurance guidelines, performance standard audits, computerized billing systems, and education in-services allow the patients and physicians to receive high-quality services at all times.
 

“Before we ventured into sleep, we had no formal sleep training … StartSmart has given us the assistance we needed to fuel our sleep diagnostic vehicle,” says Todd Kahler, RRT, director of the cardiopulmonary department at Mercy Hospital, Independence, Kansas.

PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE
StartSmart is preparing for a time when more and more sleep services will be offered outside the hospital setting.  They increasingly are using the downloading capabilities of the Internet.  The company also is equipping sites for in-home studies by coupling the technology of modular diagnostic sleep equipment with new AutoSet or self-titrating CPAP systems, an official spokesperson says

“We now have the technology to view a study overnight without actually having to be there.”

For more information about Breathing Disorders Services, Inc. and/or StartSmart call (800) 497-9BDS or visit the company’s Website at www.breathingdisorders.com.