Surgical centers tend to be technology-intensive operations, but our size precludes us from hiring full-time computer folks. We administrators either have to do it ourselves or rely on IT consultants to get us and keep us on the information superhighway. Me, I'm a do-it-yourselfer. In this article, I'm going to share some great time- and money-saving technology tips I've learned along the way. Trust me, you can do these things, too.

1 Supercharge your fax machine
If you're like most surgical centers, you rely on your fax machine to receive surgical booking and pre-op information. The timely receipt and entry of this information is critical to an efficient schedule. Often, however, faxes are misplaced, misdirected or never received - the sending party believes that the fax went through, but you never received it.

Computerized fax services can provide an easier way to manage and track incoming faxes. For one, they let you retrieve any fax you receive at a later date (we store our faxes for three months). Fax services also maintain an automatic log that shows when faxes were received - thus helping in sorting out whether the sending party ever sent the fax.

Here's a rundown of the many computerized options for receiving fax information:

• An online fax service. You can sign up to receive faxes over the Internet. The sender sends the fax to a local number, and the service either provides you with a link to a Web page where you can download the fax, or e-mails the fax to you. For HIPAA purposes, the Web page option is the most secure. Example services include efax.com and myfax.com
• In-house dedicated server. You can purchase a dedicated in-house server to answer your fax lines. While this is an expensive option and will require assistance from a local IT consultant, it provides the best security and the most flexibility. Check out FaxPress at www.castelle.com.
• Using software on existing computers. Microsoft offers a simple fax software that can answer a fax modem on an existing computer or you can purchase third-party software, such as WinFax Pro (www.symantec.com). Again, you might have to hire an IT professional to assist in setting up the system.

2 Set up a company intranet
The increased popularity of Web technology, technological advances and decreasing costs have made implementing an in-house intranet affordable for the typical surgical center. An intranet is an in-house Web site that only your employees can log into (at Brighton Surgery Center, we've had company intranet since our opening day). You can hire a Web consultant to develop your own custom-designed system, or pay for an online service to provide your company intranet. Intranets can provide the following types of services:

• news updates and meetings minutes;
• list of important information (addresses, emergency numbers and vendor lists, for example)
• online policies and procedures manual (instead of trying to find the one or two copies of the manual buried in somebody's desk, all staff have full access to it and can easily browse it online)
• calendar of events;
• picture galleries; and
• file repositories (accounts payable records and payer contracts, for example).

While the most versatile systems are those you develop yourself with the help of consultants, pre-made intranet sites use a template to develop an intranet for you almost instantly. An example of our intranet is at intrasurg.egd-consulting.com. Other examples include hyperoffice.com and weboffice.com.

3 Download open source software (it's free and easy to use)
The basic idea behind open source is simple: When programmers can read, redistribute and modify the source code for a piece of software, the software evolves. People improve it, people adapt it, people fix bugs. And this can happen at a speed that, if one is used to the slow pace of conventional software development, seems astonishing. In addition to the commercial applications you have to pay for such as Microsoft Office, you can download open source applications, which provide much of the same functionality, from the Internet at no cost. Open source programs are developed and maintained by a dedicated group of volunteers, often affiliated with major corporations or educational institutions. While they don't have the fancy packaging that you get with a commercial program, you don't pay the high cost. Just as you can for commercial products, you can purchase books to show you how to use the programs listed below.

• OpenOffice (writeOutLink("www.openoffice.org",1)). OpenOffice is an office suite much like Microsoft Office. It includes such key desktop applications as word processing, spreadsheet and presentation programs. OpenOffice can read and write files created by Microsoft Office. While OpenOffice doesn't provide all of the functionality that you get with Microsoft Office, you would be hard-pressed to see much of a difference in the average surgical center environment.
• Thunderbird (writeOutLink("www.mozilla.com",1)). This e-mail software package is much like Outlook or Outlook Express. I gave up using Outlook several months ago and switched completely to Thunderbird because of the increased speed and protection from viruses.
• Firefox (writeOutLink("www.mozilla.com",1)). This Web browser, similar to Internet Explorer, provides increased online protection and, many would argue, more protection against online spyware, pop-ups and viruses.

Just imagine saving $2,000 in software per machine - with the functionality of brand-name software - if you've got 20 PCs in your facility.