Prodding doctors to step into the digital age

MANILA, Philippines - Among small and medium entrepreneurs, healthcare practitioners are perhaps among those who have least profited from digitization.

In a study conducted by Synthesis Innovations, a Filipino-owned IT company that creates business management programs, doctors and dentists are among those who have shown the greatest resistance in using IT solutions to manage their records and business processes.

Kendrick Ang, business development partner of Synthesis Innovations, relates that doctors and dentists typically rely on their secretaries to handle most aspects of the business.

“The study disclosed that their secretaries manage their time, their billings, their cash and their inventory if they carry any,” he says.

Because these are typically haphazardly recorded, medical practitioners are unable to generate the reports they need to assess and track their business processes.

They may have no idea if their income actual covers for their overhead costs; if they are receiving the correct payments from clients; and if their patients’ histories are accurate since these are still usually filed in brick-and-mortar folders which get easily misplaced once drawers are crammed full.

Ang relates that a growing number of medical practitioners have since turned to Syncbio, a medical software designed to efficiently manage patient, doctor, billing and inventory records into a comprehensive database.

While most doctors and dentists see the value of digitizing their operations, their hesitation to adopt new processes “stems from their lack of time to change to a new system of doing things.”

Thus, Synthesis Innovations, which has more than 10 years in IT management, has resorted to providing hands-on training to the secretaries of medical practitioners.

In turn, the secretaries train the doctors on the job. The training comes free of charge with Syncbio, an out-of-the-box solution that can be customized to accommodate a doctor’s particular needs.

Ang relates that among the most appreciated features of Syncbio is its capacity to allow medical practitioners to easily scan the large amounts of data they need for reports that would benefit medical research.

“Digitizing their database facilitates analysis of their patients’ records and spotting patterns and trends,” he says.

More significantly, Syncbio helps a doctor focus his attention on what really counts — a patient’s welfare.

A clinic equipped with Syncbio lets a doctor and his secretary conveniently share files. Once a patient arrives, the secretary keys in what prompted the visit and updates information as needed.

When the patient enters the doctor’s room, the same information is displayed on the doctor’s screen. The doctor then proceeds with the treatment and documents the visit by encoding all treatments done and additional billing notes.

As the patient steps out, the secretary refers to the doctor’s notes and can bill the patient right away — no need to go back into the doctor’s room to get billing instructions.

When used with Sync Audit, an out-of-the-box accounting software that has been challenging foreign-made ones in the Philippine market, Syncbio can give medical practitioners better control of all their business processes.

Moreover, the training programs that come with the out-of-the-box solutions guarantee that users know how to maximize all program features.

Ang says his family’s steel business has immensely profited from digitization in recent decades. “Our programs incorporate our learnings which are set in a Philippine context. That is an added bonus to our users,” he says.