Pre-admission, intake, registration -- it's called by several names,
but it's referring to that stack of papers you have to fill out at the
doctor's office or the hospital.  I'm wondering how much hospitals
save if they put this process online and have the data already
available to them when the patient arrives.  Case studies or research
with real numbers and statistics is what I'm looking for - something
that shows costs before and after.

Not a lot, I guess, because:

Ambulances delivering Accident & Emergency cases would have to stop at
an Internet Cafe en route ... not a good idea when patients needs
urgent care and attention.

Also, (believe it or not) a lot of folk don't have Internet access and
others are too old or ill to know or care.

However, the idea would probably appeal to Governments who are anxious
to cut down hospital entrances.

It might be able to save on collection efforts. Sometimes, the
registration is done just to make sure the patient/insurance can be
tracked down for collection. Or it's done just to make sure the
treatment chosen is based on his/her ability to pay.

In any case, there are legal forms that need to be signed and kept for
liability reasons. I'm not sure you'll be able to avert those.

You should take a look at smart cards in Europe. I believe that there
are a couple of pilot programs that are trying to place this
information on smart cards so that emergency personnel and hospitals
can access them in an emergency.