Examining TP Systems In Clinics Information Technology Essay

Introduction

New Century Health clinic, a conventional check-up care was opened five years ago by, cardiologists Timothy Jones and Dolores Garcia in Cardiff. At present it’s looking ways to maintain their company through information technology that will also agree to for future development. With a patient support of 3.500 patients operational for 275 different companies, the correct repairs of patient records are a highest concern. Simultaneously with this is the fast and well-organized dealing out of insurance forms as New Century Health Clinic currently agrees to 34 dissimilar insurance policies. All along with the patient files and insurance, all portion of the clinic’s function, including payroll, tax reporting, and employee profit allotment will be considered.

As an IT professional, New Century Health clinic has come to me in the hopes of modernizing their office practices. The main objective here is to provide an IT solution that will not only meet their current goals, but also keep pace with any potential growth within the company. Through implementing a total solution, from installation to training, the transition to a modernised workplace will be efficient, thorough, and cost effective.

Thorough preliminary report, different information systems will be assessed to include Electronic Data Interchange, Vertical and Horizontal Systems packages, as well as use of the internet.

CHAPTER 1

Organizational Chart

When necessary all six office employees help with patient records, insurance processing, and appointment processing. At the end of each month all office employees help with the preparation of patient statements.

The first business process that New Century Health Clinic performs is payroll. Payroll is performed by Fred Brown. The next business process that New Century performs is daily appointment lists. The daily appointment list is performed by Lisa sung. The third business process that New Century performs is ordering of office and clinic supplies. This process is performed by Carla Herrera.

New Century Health Clinic could use a TP system for ordering office and clinical supplies. They could also use it for accounting, maintenance of patient records, and insurance billing. A TP system would allow New Century to bring together the activities of three employees and allow them to manage customer records more effectively, sales, and inventory for the office and clinic. New Century could use a business support system for organizing and ordering of inventory, patient statements, and accounting. It will also allow New Century to create a “what if” scenario to see if they should raise the price of certain services they provide to their customers. A business support system would let New Century know when they are getting low on a clinical and/or office supplies. In example if a patient has to have a certain test done and New Century is getting low or is out of the test materials, the system let them know when to order the test material. New Century could us a User productivity system for linking and providing efficiency to the office and clinic. For example if a doctor needs certain medical information on a patient, for an appointment, a User productivity system will allow him/her to access the patient’s information on a patient database. He/she would be able to do this without having to go to the office and search through hundreds of patient records.

New Century Health Clinic should consider B2B transactions as it could potentially decrease expenses for ordering clerical and medical supplies. B2B transactions would allow New Century Health Clinic to acquire information about market prices and product availability. This would be financially beneficial, as they could select the best deals from suppliers. They should also consider vertical and horizontal system packages. Horizontal system software is an application for payroll and inventory which are departments within the clinic. Vertical systems are created specifically to accommodate the unique requirements of a company, including the needs of medical practices. Therefore, these systems as a package would provide software that is specifically designed for the needs of the company. Along with this, New Century should consider internet-based solutions because, aside from an advertising standpoint, it will allow customers to make appointments online and order certain medicines. It would also allow employees to access suppliers online and allow for online ordering of supplies, which would create a more efficient ordering system.

CHAPTER 2

To begin the preliminary investigation we need the information from everyone who works at new century. The techniques will we use in fact-finding is a response letter.

Dear New Century Health Clinic,

Commanding Consultants would like to encourage you to ask any question. Feel free to ask us about our degrees in education, our experience in the field, our previous projects and their success rate, as well as any ideas we may have come up with for your situation. We have developed numerous, beneficial and innovative concepts that we are eager to share with your company. We would like to understand how your current system works, the knowledge and ability of your staff, as well as any GUI and options you would prefer in your program. We would also like to plan out a price range.

We think New Century Health Clinic would greatly benefit from a new computerized organizational system. It would cut down on potential human errors and offer a wide variety of features not possible with standard filing. We would love the opportunity to work with a company like New Century Health Clinic.

Sincerely,

Commanding Consultants

This new system creates a strong business case. It will cut back on receptionist staff and hours, while minimizing human error. The new system will allow employees at the clinic to synchronize schedules most effectively. It will provide better customer service, and retain records in an organized fashion for customer knowledge.

Feasibility

Economic:

Can NCHC afford the costs of a new system at this time?

Will the system compensate monetarily for the business over time?

Technical:

What actions need to be taken in order to train the staff about using the new program?

Will the system crash, causing loss of patient data?

Operational:

Do the current staffs support the idea?

Will it replace current staff?

Will it be more efficient than the current status?

Schedule:

How long will it take to build/design?

Are there any necessary steps to take beforehand?

Will NCHC need a project manager to be assigned from Commanding Consultants?

Preliminary Investigation

What is the problem?

The problem is whether or not the computerized system is feasible.

Define the constraints

Constraints may include financial status, time frame, and employee opinion. By talking directly to the financial manager, discrepancies will be cleared up.

Perform fact finding

To find facts, we would need to research the project, and poll the employees directly impacted by the new system. We would use a survey that questions their feelings about getting a new system, along with problems that they have encountered with the old system.

Evaluate feasibility

If all feasibility tests pass, idea is feasible.

Estimate project development time and cost

Quote will be given from office systems consultant.

Present results and recommendations to management

CHAPTER 3

List the individuals you would like to interview during the systems analysis phase.

In order to implement a computerized office system, team Commanding Consultants previously recommended the investigation of three systems within the New Century Heath Clinic. Interviewing individuals, who are associated with and knowledgeable about the process for these systems, will help our team establish a detailed analysis. This will provide vital information that will ultimately become the lifeline for creating an effective computerized office system. These individuals are as follows:

Patient Records Supervisor and Team Leader: Susan Gifford

Operational Employees

Insurance Reporting and Accounting Supervisor and Team Leader: Tom Capaletti

Scheduling and Secretarial Operations Supervisor and Team Leader: Lisa Sung

Prepare a list of objectives for each of the interviews you will conduct.

Dr. Garcia has expressed her wariness for using up precious time for conducting interviews. In order to be effective with a short amount of time, all of the operational employees will be interviewed in a group. By conducting a group interview for these employees, not only will time be saved, but informal structures will also become evident. Informal structures are based on relationships created by social activities, events, or work assignments. Within these informal structures, people can be more influential by using their relationship as a manipulative standpoint. These people often acquire more knowledge then needed to complete their job due to the networking of coworkers. Therefore, it is essential to interview individuals with these informal structures, in order to receive a broad spectrum of information. With this group interview aside, Susan Gifford, Tom Capaletti, and Lisa Sung will all be interviewed separately in order to limit biased answers. Objectives for the group and individuals are as follows:

Operational Employees:

To uncover hidden informal structures

Discover essential information that is presently unknown

To develop an understanding of the processes they perform

To gather ideas and suggestions to better the systems

To discover any problems or issues frequently encountered

Susan Gifford (Patient Records Supervisor):

To decide what data should be allotted security previsions

To find what her job entails

To understand what processes she performs

To gather ideas and suggestions to better the system

To uncover any obstacles

Tom Capaletti (Insurance Reporting and Accounting Supervisor):

To discover where data is received from, in order to complete the system

To decide whether there is proper communication accessibility between necessary departments

To understand what processes he performs

To decide whether there is an efficient and effective outlet for inputting and outputting data

To uncover any hindrances

Lisa Sung (Scheduling and Secretarial Operations Supervisor):

To understand the process she performs

To decide whether the scheduling system is organized and effective

To find problems or issues frequently encountered

To gather any suggestions, concerns, or comments

Prepare a list of specific questions for each individual you will interview.

Operational Employees:

Have any of you encountered any problems that hinder you from doing your jobs to their fullest potential, and if so, who or what do you find responsible for these problems?

On a scale of 0 to 10, have any of you ever found it difficult to meet standards and to finish within the time allotted, 0 being never and 10 being daily?

Do any of you frequently work overtime in order to complete tasks, and if so, what do you all think could be done to improve time management or job efficiency?

What do you all do on a normal day at work?

What kinds of tasks are required of you all to complete?

Are there gaps in communications and if so where do these gaps lie?

What do all of you feel should be changed in order to improve communication if there are any gaps?

Is there anything that we need to know that might be of significant importance?

Susan Gifford (Patient Records Supervisor):

Where do you receive information?

Is communication accessible between departments, and if not, where are you running into difficulties?

Are patient records easy to compile, or is it difficult to track down data?

Please explain to us what a normal day is like for you? What kind of tasks do you perform? Can you give an overview of what your job entails?

Do you have any suggestions that could improve the efficiency of your department?

On a scale from 0 to 10, how often do you encounter any problems or obstacles that make doing your job difficult, 0 being never and 10 being daily?

Tom Capaletti (Insurance Reporting and Accounting Supervisor):

Where do you receive data from?

Have you ever encountered gaps in communication accessibility? If so, from a scale of 0 to 10, how difficult was it for you to report or receive necessary information, 0 being not difficult, 10 being extremely difficult?

What is a normal day like for you? What processes do you perform?

Lisa Sung (Scheduling and Secretarial Operations Supervisor):

Do you find that your current scheduling system is organized and easy to use?

What is a normal day like for you? What kinds of tasks are required of you to complete?

On a scale from 0 to 10 how easy is it for you to communicate with parties or individuals of necessary concern, 0 being easy and 10 being extremely difficult?

What comments, questions, or concerns do you have, whether it be for your own understanding or to better the new system?

Design a questionnaire that will go to a sample of New Century patients to find out if they were satisfied with current insurance and scheduling procedures. Your questionnaire should follow the suggestions in this chapter. Also, decide what sampling method you will use and explain the reason for your choice.

It is important to know whether the patients at New Century Health Clinic are satisfied with the current insurance and scheduling procedures. To receive an accurate representation of the patients, a questionnaire should be distributed. In order to conduct a survey, it would be useful to enlist a sampling method. The sampling method that Commanding Consults are choosing as appropriate for the situation is systematic sampling of those who have medical insurance. Since New Century Health Clinic has a fairly large patient base, it would be difficult and unnecessary to survey all 3,500 patients. In order to represent 50 of New Century’s patients, every 10th patient needs to be reviewed. Instead of being every 70th patient, which is mathematically logical, it is important to consider that only 15% of people selected to survey will return the response. Receiving the views of 50 patients will give our team enough information to gather a fairly accurate interpretation of the overall clientele population.

New Century Health Clinic

Questionnaire

Here at New Century Health Clinic, we take pride in creating a welcoming and accommodating environment, centered on our patients. You are the lifeline to our business and we are deeply appreciative that you have chosen us as your clinic. In order to ensure your satisfaction with our services, we ask that you complete the following questionnaire about our insurance and scheduling procedures. Please complete this form and send it in by November 15th. Please use the enclosed envelope. If any questions or concerns arise, feel free to contact us on our helpline at 1.800.727.NCHC.

A. YOUR OBSERVATIONS

Please answer each question by checking the box that you feel appropriate to the question.

I have been a patient at the clinic for:

[ ] less than 1 year

[ ] 3-4 years

[ ] 1-2 years

[ ] 5 years

The last time I received services from New Century Health Clinic was:

[ ] within the passed week

[ ] within the passed year and a half

[ ] within the passed month

[ ] within the passed two years

[ ] within the passed 6 months

[ ] within the passed three years

[ ] within the passed year

[ ] within the passed five years

I have missed an appointment because I did not receive a reminder call.

[ ] True

[ ] False

I have been scheduled for an appointment and was later told that the time slot was no longer available.

[ ] True

[ ] False

I have noticed issues in my insurance billing.

[ ] True

[ ] False

B. YOUR COMMENTS

Please feel free to relay and problems, concerns, questions you may want to express.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

(If necessary, please attach another sheet)