Embedded BI For Real-Time AlertsEmbedded BI For Real-Time Alerts

Poor information can slow down a healthcare provider's processes from the moment a patient walks in the door. If the patient offers incomplete or wrong identification and insurance information, or the receptionist or scheduler inputs the data incorrectly, the impact can be felt in inefficient downstream processes, including billing and reporting to Medicare, Medicaid, and private insurers.

Traditional IT architectures separate business intelligence and the information management systems that handle data quality and matching from the transaction systems where the data usually first enters the system. Healthcare providers often have their IT group or a third-party data-quality specialist reconcile the data, processes that take at least 24 hours. During this lag time, billing and other downstream applications are exposed to data errors.

To cut costs and improve efficiency, some providers are looking at integrating or embedding BI and information management in the transaction systems themselves. In this way, BI systems can play a direct role in reducing the time between when data is recorded and when it's verified for quality and has the stamp of approval for use in the provider's business and financial processes.

QuadraMed develops transactional applications that have InterSystems DeepSee BI systems embedded in them for real-time data analysis. QuadraMed's Affinity healthcare information system uses DeepSee to support the application of rules to incoming patient data. It matches data with other sources to make sure it's correct, in the right format, and meets standards for each data type.

To remedy problems in real time, the system sends immediate alerts to the scheduler or receptionist if the data doesn't appear to be correct. Organizations can set the rules differently if they don't want to stop a registration immediately for "soft" errors, such as the patient not having his insurance card.