Providers can save a lot of money, time and other resources if their administrative systems are preconfigured for their facilities before they're delivered. Basing those systems on best practices for streamlined care can reduce inefficiencies and implementation costs, particularly for providers with limited resources.
Vendors like preconfiguration, too, because it eliminates many of the unknowns that tend to bog down implementations and increase the risk of problems.
At the Healthcare Financial Management Association's Annual National Institute (ANI) in San Diego Monday, Lawson Software unveiled the results of the implementation of its Enterprise Financial Management and Supply Chain Management suites at Arkansas-based Baptist Health.
The implementations at Baptist finished six months ahead of schedule, thanks to Lawson's comprehensive business assessment to predict the work required for the project.
Lawson's use of best practices, consulting, and experience-based methods have helped customers in the community care setting cut costs, representatives of the company said at ANI.
Sara Van Kempen, Lawson's marketing director for healthcare, said that community-based providers are limited in the efficiency of their implementations simply because the organizations tend to be so much smaller than others. Lawson is currently delivering its QuickStep Enterprise Asset Management solution to 100- to 250-bed community hospitals.
"They don't have as many resources available to them," Van Kempen said. She noted that the company's use of preconfigured software based on best practices cuts the time and money needed for startup. "Because we are configuring and doing a lot of that work in advance, it streamlines the amount of resources they need to implement our software," she said.
"(Preconfiguration) reduces complexity, which reduces time to implement, and that reduces cost," said Steffan Haithcox, director of Healthcare Strategy for Lawson. He said the tools offered by Lawson are designed to help minimize the number of decisions a provider needs to make in implementations.
QuickStep Healthcare hit the market one month ago. Van Kempen said the use of best practices in developing the software has changed the role of the vendor in the provider implementations. "Instead of 'tell me everything' (that your products can do), it's 'tell me what works best,'" she said.
Haithcox said other vendors, such as Oracle, also offer a preconfigured system. "I think what we're doing is a little bit different," said Van Kempen. "We're not just preconfiguring but doing consulting and leading simulations to help train."
Lawson is now focusing on the delivery of business intelligence dashboards tailored for the community hospital space, Haithcox said.