Empowering Clients Through Technology
Application
Description
- Physician office management information system
Advantages
- Provide self-service capabilities for end users and employees
- Streamline and automate manual processes
- Increase efficiency
- Reduce operational costs
- Increase sales revenues
CLIENT BACKGROUND
A leading healthcare services company has been helping medical practices automate their operations and navigate the challenging waters of clinical and practice management workflow for nearly 25 years. Its products and services promote informed decision-making, increased efficiency, and ultimately higher quality patient care at a lower cost. As one of the primary providers of payment and transaction services, it is at the vanguard of bringing innovative practice management solutions to the rapidly changing healthcare industry.
BUSINESS PROBLEM
An overall strategy was needed to leverage assets on the Web and provide customers with self-service capabilities, especially in the areas of enrollment, claims status and bill payments. Making processes and information Web-based provided a single point of contact for customer service and allowed clients to be more self-sufficient in addition to increasing efficiency and reducing operational costs.
SOLUTION
Prolifics delivered a comprehensive portal solution for enrolling medical providers, processing claim forms, selling medical office equipment and supplies, and offering computer-based training in addition to other services for clients and employees. The healthcare company researched several vendors, including BEA and Oracle, before deciding on IBM WebSphere for its robust architecture, e-commerce and integration capabilities. Using Red Hat Linux as the operating system, IBM WebSphere, WebSphere Portal, Rational Application Developer, and DB2 were used to implement this portal project.
Prolifics was recommended as an IBM business partner having the track record and technical expertise to help achieve project goals. The company knew there were some integration challenges with its backend systems so it first enlisted Prolifics’ help with a business value assessment and proof of concept before engaging Prolifics consultants to design and implement the award-winning portal solution.
By giving customers the ability to input provider information and empowering them to act on their own behalf—-which keeps them involved in all phases of the enrollment process, the company scored a huge win for customer satisfaction. The time savings demonstrated in the first phase of this project has already shown tremendous business value and garnered positive feedback from both external and internal customers. The target audience for this portal is 10,000 customers and will grow to 16,000 customers.
The Prolifics team of WebSphere and Portal developers and administrators will continue to help with the future vision of bringing additional processes online, supporting electronic health records, and enabling e-commerce capabilities, allowing the company to increase sales to new customers in addition to its existing customer base. This Client Services Portal will be a trusted partner—facilitating customers to self-navigate a constantly changing healthcare environment.