Have you had the opportunity to use our patient portal — MyTeamCare? You can get to it at www.texastechphysicians.com/myteamcare.  I think you will find it helpful.

Of course, first you have to sign up. You can get started by asking one of our friendly patient services specialists at any of our clinics — they will be glad to assist you.

After you request it, you will receive an email with a temporary password that you can replace with one of your preference. Security is critical and this extra step is for security reasons, rather than just going online and requesting a password.

The portal has a lot of potential — and I put it that way knowing that many will interpret that statement as “it has a ways to go.”  And, truthfully, that is what I am saying. It does have a “ways” to go, but it is important to start someplace and what we have is a fine start.  Part of the excitement is refining our portal and making it even better in the future.

First of all, if you are a patient, it has all of your medications listed. That’s nice — no need to carry around a list in your head of those hard-to-spell medications and dosages. You can also quickly request a refill and have it go directly to your provider. It also has your medical history (past surgeries, procedures, and so forth), health issues, allergies, and immunizations.

Of course, this data doesn’t magically appear — it has to be entered and it is important that you look at it from time to time and ensure its accuracy. What I am talking about is you may have quit taking a certain medication or if you notice the date of a particular surgery is wrong in the system — then you can tell the clinic when you go in or even send them an online communication through the portal that a correction is indicated.

When you can look at it from your easy chair, it is easier to catch these errors (than at the time of an appointment) and get them corrected.

Another nice feature is that you can get most test results online. So, rather than using your time and others calling on that latest lipid profile, you can look it up from home. This is one of the areas that I mentioned to Dr. Craig Bradley that I think we can improve the portal — yes, the results were there but there was no context or interpretation. What does it mean when it says, for example, “Giant Platelet-Present.”  I think an explanation written in terms the layperson can understand would be very helpful.  Enhanced graphics on lab values would be great where you could see your results against a normal range.  Furthermore, you could click on what is meant if out of range. In other words, I think the enhancements should focus on how to make it easier for folks to use and more meaningful to them.

Finally, you can view all upcoming appointments and request an appointment with your doctor’s office. You can also send a non-urgent message to a physician in a secure manner and receive a reply the same way. This can eliminate some of the back-and-forth telephone tag and clear up issues.

As stated at the beginning, it is a good portal today with great potential for the future. It represents a bit of a partnership between the patient and the physician in getting the information recorded, corrected and maintained.

Some patients will be very interested in the portal and the information contained therein and others… not so much.