Pain Treatment Centers of America
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Location:
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Little Rock, AR
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Employees:
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398
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PowerDMS Customer:
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Accreditation:
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ACHC Premier Site
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Organization:
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Multidisciplinary healthcare system operating in TX, AR, and MS comprised of 25 clinics and 10 ambulatory surgery centers offering services in: ● Pain management ● Neurosurgery ● Orthopedics ● Behavioral health ● Physical therapy ● Family practice |
Healthcare policy management software helped Pain Treatment Centers of America achieve zero quality deficiencies in an ACHC survey.
Pain Treatment Centers of America (PTCOA) achieved zero deficiencies for quality in one of its first Accreditation Commission for Health Care (ACHC) surveys after implementing a centralized healthcare compliance software solution. By replacing manual, binder-based processes with digital tools, PTCOA improved policy access, reduced survey preparation time, and created a scalable compliance framework for growth and ongoing survey readiness.
Pain Treatment Centers of America (PTCOA)’s success represents a significant achievement fueled by greater operational clarity, enhanced accountability, and streamlined oversight across the organization. By implementing Policy and Standards by PowerDMS, PTCOA established a centralized system for managing policies, procedures, and compliance requirements, enabling teams to work more efficiently and consistently. The platform provided leadership with increased visibility into organizational processes, helping ensure staff remained informed, aligned, and compliant with critical standards.
Beyond improving day-to-day operations, PowerDMS empowered PTCOA to strengthen its culture of accountability and continuous improvement. The organization’s ability to standardize documentation, track acknowledgments, and maintain readiness for audits demonstrates the tangible impact of an effective policy and compliance management solution. PTCOA’s results not only highlight the effectiveness of its implementation strategy but also underscore how invaluable PowerDMS can be for healthcare organizations seeking to improve governance, reduce risk, and support long-term operational excellence.
PTCOA operates 25 clinics and 10 ambulatory surgery centers throughout Arkansas, Texas, and Mississippi. Their multi-specialty care model includes pain management, neurosurgery, orthopedics, behavioral health, physical therapy, and family medicine. As the organization scaled, so did the complexity of managing consistent policies across diverse clinical and administrative environments.
Kitty Cone, Chief Legal Officer and Compliance Officer, joined PTCOA in 2023 and immediately identified significant risks in how policies were managed using a manual process.
"There were only a few written policies, and they were primarily on a shared drive. Policies consisted of emails from several years ago that were shared when an issue arose," Cone said.
This decentralized approach resulted in confusion, inconsistent practices, and limited visibility into who had reviewed or signed off on policy changes. Writing policies and protocols in healthcare is an important part of enforcing accountability and ensuring patient safety. It is critical for an organization as large as PTCOA to ensure its policies are updated and accessible to employees wherever they are located. In addition, employees are able to access policies on their phone quickly.
Chelsea Farmer, Director of Quality, witnessed these challenges firsthand for years.
"We had grown to the point where our old way of doing things didn’t work anymore," said Farmer. "We were multi-state, multi-specialty. And every team needed clear, written policies to follow." - Chelsea Farmer
One of the most immediate pain points was reaccreditation – a process that was time-consuming, inconsistent, and labor-intensive. Each surgery center maintained 13 or more physical binders filled with approximately 500 policies. Survey readiness required hours of manual review and coordination to ensure documents were current and accurately reflected regulatory requirements.
"Reaccreditation prep was exhausting," Cone shared. "It meant hours spent combing through paper manuals to ensure we were current, consistent, and compliant."
This process not only consumed valuable staff time but also created the risk of missing critical documentation during an audit, which could cause a formal “finding” from auditors or a failed audit. During a survey, the ability to quickly locate the relevant policy to provide to a surveyor immediately can help avoid a finding or a deficiency.
With a network of 25 healthcare sites and growing, PTCOA needed a better way to manage compliance, ensure policy access, and maintain accreditation readiness for all locations. To solve these issues, PTCOA adopted Policy and Standards by PowerDMS. This centralized healthcare policy management software platform enhanced survey readiness, improved communication, and established a scalable foundation for policy oversight across multiple states.
Cone had experience with other compliance platforms and understood the limitations of systems that weren’t designed for healthcare. Many tools lacked the ability to manage policy workflows efficiently or provide responsive customer support. PTCOA required a solution built for healthcare operations and regulatory environments that could be adapted to fit PTCOA’s growing geographic footprint.
“Everything was very manual,” Cone said. “For example, if we needed to make a policy revision, we had to email it back and forth. There was no tracking regarding the revision, who was involved in the policy’s development and approval. It was a very inefficient way of doing things.”
After receiving a personal recommendation, Cone evaluated Policy and Standards and found that both aligned well with PTCOA’s goals, so they implemented the PowerDMS solutions in 2023.
-Kitty Cone
Chief Legal Officer and Compliance Officer, Pain Treatment Centers of America
The switch to policy management software improved visibility and communication across the organization. Policies that were once buried in binders or inboxes were now accessible to staff through a centralized, digital policy platform.
"Now employees get an email, they click in, and they know exactly what to do," Farmer said. "When I run reports, the majority of them are actually getting in there and doing it,” Farmer said, regarding employees completing policy review and signature tasks. “And the fact that I’m not hearing a whole lot of complaining is a total win.”
Access to up-to-date policies through a centralized system improved the experience for both current staff and new hires. Instead of searching shared drives or waiting for clarification, employees can quickly locate the most current protocols in one place. This streamlined access strengthens communication, reduces administrative burden, and ensures staff are consistently aligned on the right procedures. In a healthcare setting, that consistency is critical. When clinicians and staff follow the most current, standardized protocols, it helps reduce variability in care, supports adherence to regulatory and safety standards, and minimizes the risk of errors or outdated practices being used in patient treatment. With a single source of truth, PTCOA can confidently support safer, more consistent patient care while reducing risk and liability across the organization.
Shortly after adopting Policy and Standards, PTCOA underwent an ACHC survey. With their healthcare compliance software in place, policies were organized, current, and fully mapped to accreditation standards. No more searching through binders to locate policies during a survey meant PTCOA staff could quickly find and provide what auditors needed. Instead of hours of searching, they could find information in seconds or minutes with a quick search in the system. The result was a seamless experience and clean survey report with zero findings for “quality.”
"That level of readiness and control is only possible when you have the right tools in place," Cone said.
Inspectors could see when each policy had last been reviewed, who had signed it, and how it connected to the required standards. This level of transparency helped PTCOA demonstrate its commitment to compliance and continuous improvement.
With expansion continuing across all three states, PTCOA now uses Policy and Standards to support new site onboarding, team training, and long-term operational consistency.
"We have new locations coming online all the time," said Cone. "This framework helps us onboard them, train them, and make sure they meet our standards from day one."
The ability to scale while maintaining centralized control has been essential to PTCOA’s strategy. It allows leadership to stay ahead of compliance requirements while focusing on delivering high-quality care.
Healthcare organizations that continue to manage policies through disconnected systems, shared drives, and manual processes face significant operational and legal risks when responding to patient safety events, regulatory complaints, surveys, or litigation. By implementing a centralized online policy portal through PowerDMS, Pain Treatment Centers of America (PTCOA) established a single source of truth for policies, procedures, and clinical guidance across its growing network of locations.
This centralized approach has strengthened compliance by ensuring staff have immediate access to the most current policies and can easily acknowledge, review, and adhere to organizational requirements. It has also helped PTCOA standardize the delivery of care across its geographic footprint, reducing variation in clinical and administrative processes and promoting greater consistency in patient experiences and outcomes. With clear, accessible policies available at the point of care, providers and staff are better equipped to follow evidence-based practices, support quality improvement initiatives, and deliver safe, high-quality care.
PTCOA's success demonstrates how healthcare policy management software built for the healthcare industry can do more than streamline policy management—it can serve as a foundation for stronger governance, improved operational efficiency, enhanced survey readiness, and more consistent care delivery across the organization. By creating visibility, accountability, and standardization at scale, PowerDMS has become an invaluable tool in helping PTCOA support both regulatory compliance and clinical excellence.
“The one thing that I’ve heard repeatedly, especially from nurses who come from other healthcare systems, is how much they appreciate that we have a policy portal and can quickly locate written guidance,” Cone shared.
By aligning policies with standards, providing real-time access to current documents, and reducing the burden of manual tracking, digital policy platforms allow healthcare organizations to operate more confidently in today’s regulatory environment.
"PowerPolicy isn’t just a document system," Cone said. "It’s how we protect our providers, our employees, our patients, and our legacy."
Want to achieve results similar to PTCOA? Schedule a consultation to explore how healthcare compliance software can help your organization standardize policies, improve compliance visibility, and stay survey-ready.
Learn more about policy management software for healthcare
It’s a digital platform that centralizes policy creation, version control, and accreditation standards mapping to help healthcare organizations meet compliance and accreditation requirements.
PTCOA replaced paper binders with a digital platform, achieving zero findings for “quality” in an ACHCU survey shortly after implementation of Policy.
These tools streamline survey prep, provide real-time compliance tracking, and support consistent onboarding across multi-site healthcare organizations.
Implementation timelines and processes can vary depending on the size of your organization and the scope of the project. To learn more read the blog: Healthcare Policy Management Software Implementation: What to Expect with Policy by PowerDMS