Medical Practice and Billing Software

Client

Project 

Back in 2013, we were contacted by the owners of a powerful US-based healthcare enterprise as they were looking for the opportunity to strengthen their full-stack developers team for the upcoming ONC Health IT Certification.

They needed just a single full-stack developer for certain feature development at that time (medical billing automation). The cooperation turned out to be a very fruitful one, and their software, being a gigantic healthcare platform, always demands extra effort, so soon enough we expanded to providing them with a team of full-stack software developers of three people.

The company hired a lot of external developers to successfully pass the certification, and Elinext team developers were the only ones who remained to work on the project after the process of certification was completed. That is the result of the great performance of the team. We have plenty of experience custom software development solutions for medical billing automation. These days, our developers work on the ongoing development of new features for the platform. Our team, with occasional changes within the squad, has been working on the project for over a decade.

The project at the moment is a constantly updated web app development project for doctor workflow management, electronic health records management, medical billing automation, and scheduling, with a streamlined, intuitive interface.

Challenges

Here are the initial challenges we had at the beginning of the project:

• Make the platform of our client eligible for the ONC Health IT Certification Program
• A wider scope of tasks not necessarily connected with the ONC certification
• Constant work on the seamless core functionality of the software
• A great number of new tasks all the time due to the nature of the software
• Estimation, planning, and delivery schedule at the early stages of involvement with the project were difficult due to the gigantic volume of the project
• Use of innovative specific knowledge to keep the platform compliant with different standards and regulations, including HIPAA.

Process

The process varied throughout the years Elinext has been involved in working on this project. For most of this decade, we had three senior Java full-stack developers operating on the project, developing features for medical billing automation as part of our custom Java development services. At some point, for certain features, we also had three extra JavaScript developers working on the projects, as well as Angular developers, contributing to our Angular software development services.

While working on the project, our team uses many innovative and specific stuff and there are always new challenges that require us to go above and beyond.

ONC development took 2 iterations of two or three years each. The documentation load was enormous as one could imagine, so the tech tasks for the features our developers had to work on weren’t always perfect. That created difficulties in estimations, planning, and delivery of certain product parts.

The communication is seamless at the moment. We communicate with other external developers only if there’s a need, and reporting to the client goes smoothly and only when needed.

Solution

After completing all the tasks necessary for the ONC Health IT Certification Program, we continued to work on different features. At the time we’re in our 11 years of partnership.

It would take too much time to describe even the most basic functions we’ve been working on over the course of the decade. That’s why in this section, we’re just going to leave the information about the key modules, and functionality blocks since it’s impossible to be more detailed in this format.

Module 1: Core

This module will include all the core functionality which is hard to describe in any specific way. The software allows practitioners to conduct their everyday operations. It includes the following tabs and parts:

Patient flow

Handles the flow when patients come to the practice’s office and check in / fill some preliminary documentation.

With the help of this module, a doctor can create, view, and manage patient profiles, filling in the information about the disease which includes type, quality, timing, severity, the level of improvement or deterioration, and other parameters;

Cash/Billing/Business flow

Full-scale automated medical billing system in this module. It handles any potential workflows involving cash/real money which includes selling medical items to patients, medical claims, and various billing scenarios.

A practitioner can use a powerful task workbench system to contact either coach, support, staff, vendors, or billing team providing a fast and efficient way to address any questions/issues that might arise.

The front office may find Invoice management and automation in medical billing useful in this module.

Scheduling block

Enables practitioners to see their own daily/weekly schedule displaying patients’ appointments, meetings, and any other events in a calendar manner.

This block enables doctors to manage and keep track of their patients’ schedules including. The functionality includes creating new patient accounts, and demographics, scheduling appointments, check-in, rescheduling, using patient alerts, and addressing no-shows and no future appointments.

Reports

A huge amount of various reports are available for practitioners for any possible scenario they might need a report for.

These and several other key blocks were either developed or enhanced by the Elinext team.

Module 2: PHI

Every automated medical billing system has to follow strict regulations. Stores patients’ Protected Health Information representing it in a convenient and compliant way allowing the user to manipulate it in any possible manner. Also supports everything needed for ONC certification which includes various functionalities.

Module 3: XDocs

XDocs have evolved into a separate project/platform, allowing users to rapidly set up documents of any complexity they can potentially need in a couple of minutes. There are previous (older) versions of XDocs which represent huge pre-developed forms allowing practitioners to fill out any patient-related information.

This module also includes dynamic XDocs. With the help of macros and predetermined templates, the practitioners can make any document they’d like for the patient and it could be printed or virtually distributed in a matter of seconds.

Module 4: Patient Portal

This is a separate section of the platform that is only available for patients. The functionality of that is very limited to what a patient might possibly need. A mobile mHealth app development service has recently been introduced, making it even more convenient for patients to use. Elinext actively contributes to the development of features for this module as well.

Here is what a patient could do with the help of the app (not a full list of functions, but some functionality):

• Checking into the system at the terminal with the help of a medical card barcode or personal pin-code;
• Buying medicaments within the app using the integrated POS terminal;
• Filing in the application form is automatically sent to a doctor to give some insight before the patient comes.

Results

As the platform is an automated medical billing system, a complex enterprise solution that aims to cover every little detail about medical practice and billing, it always needs continuous work on improving the existing functionality and delivering new features.

We have several engineers dedicated to this project, and some of them have been involved since the beginning of cooperation, hence over a decade. For most of them, this is not the first automated medical billing system and patient delivery management solution they developed.

The initial goal of the cooperation, the ONC certification, was reached, and as the team involved proved themselves efficient, we continued our journey with the customer.

At the moment, features that are under development include customized document creation, ensuring medical practice workflow automation, and contributing to the better performance of the platform. Our team also helps the customer with the platform integration with other third-party applications. Everything they needed for sustainable medical billing automation.

As new features are planned years ahead, we anticipate continuous cooperation with the client, and new module development alongside the enhancement of the current functionality of automation in medical billing.

Business Effects

This particular customer has been cooperating with us for a significant time. Plenty of features of their automated medical billing system were developed by Elinext team, and we consider this fruitful cooperation that benefits booth sides. Their initial request of passing ONC health IT certification was completed years ago, and enhancements of the system are made till this day. The system can’t function without constant updates and new features implementation, so we see the cooperation lasting for years and years ahead.

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