Scheduling Software?

[Conphas]

Sorry if this is too off topic, but I thought I'd get a lot of help from a resource like this...

My company is finally joining the electronic scheduling era and I've been made a leader for aquiring that software but other than Outlook (which isn't really an electronic scheduler) I've not had much experience.

I want to take my time and get something that will work well for us.

What we need (I think) is to be able to...
schedule physicians
somehow 'schedule' exam rooms & equipment
schedule staff
have key users have access to make changes to any schedule
have all users able to view all schedules
(exporting to outlook would be nice too)

Assuming money is no object (we'll decide a budget for this later), does anyone have suggestions? Or a good resource for reviewing scheduling software?

 

[General Crespin]

Have you tried contacting other companies that do what you do, to see what they use?

 

[xxan0xx]

What type of industry do you work in?

 

[Conphas]

Clinical research is the field. Runs much like a physicians office but for the fact we don't need to bill anything.

Something like the following situation would be great...

Betty Smith needs to be scheduled for Coordinator Suzy on Study B with Dr. Frank at 0800 for physical, vitals, ECG, bloodwork. We also need a 'blank' field so we can write information for reminder calls similar to "needs to fast 9hours before visit"

We'll need to print out a list of "no shows" and have the ability to print out a week (or day, or month etc) schedule by coordinator (as well as for physician).

Our main goal is to be able to maximize scheduling without over booking physicians or "machines" like ECG equipment or laboratory.

We've called some of our other sites but no one seems to have any helpful information, many are still using pen/paper. Some have tried some systems and not liked them.

The problem I've found looking at "medical" software is that they focus on making billing and insurance easier which is a function my facility would never use as we don't bill.

IThanks guys, I appreciate your time and anything you might be able to help with.

 

[pigster]

Googling "medical office scheduling" shows quite a few products, some with free demos

 

[zacdl]

A regular old calendar does just this.

Outlook would do the job too. Google Calendar would even work.

Seriously, don't you have a receptionist or something that can maintain that calendar?

I just think you are going to have a heck of a time finding what you are wanting. Just a plain old calendar would be a ton less hassle.

 

[XOR != OR]

I just think you are going to have a heck of a time finding what you are wanting. Just a plain old calendar would be a ton less hassle.

Not really; There are a ton out there for the dental field alone. The likelihood of these things existing in the medical field is fairly certain.

If you know any languages, you could always roll your own. Believe it or not, this is often a better solution that some vendor-lockin proprietary crap. At least with this option, you are free to move to whatever at a later date if you choose to. A little php+mysql+javascript/html and you are set.

 

[Conphas]

I'm getting a ton of telephone calls and emails since I started looking. So many of them are proud of how good/integrated/seamless their billing part of the software is and we don't even bill.

We have a receptionist that handles the paper calendar now but the book is only so big and we need more rows. I suppose she could get 3 books but then she'd be spending all her time trying to figure out which rooms/machines are getting double booked. That would mean I might have to start answering my own phones... That's just not going to happen. A computer could just pop up with that information.

Yes, any calendar would work for writing stuff in, I want it to do more though. And, maybe there isn't a program out there that will do what I'm fantasizing it doing, but I thought I'd try.

 

[XOR != OR]

Yes, any calendar would work for writing stuff in, I want it to do more though. And, maybe there isn't a program out there that will do what I'm fantasizing it doing, but I thought I'd try.

I'm sure there is something that matches close. Dentrix, while dental industry dependant, would do what you are after I think. Granted, you'd have to mod the hell out of the procedure codes, and the billing might not work given that it's aimed at dental offices, but then again it might.

Not that I am really suggesting using dentrix; I am merely pointing out that something from the dental industry would do what you are thinking about, so I'm sure there is something more specific to your field.

 

[AMD_RULES]

Sorry if this is too off topic, but I thought I'd get a lot of help from a resource like this...

My company is finally joining the electronic scheduling era and I've been made a leader for aquiring that software but other than Outlook (which isn't really an electronic scheduler) I've not had much experience.

I want to take my time and get something that will work well for us.

What we need (I think) is to be able to...
schedule physicians
somehow 'schedule' exam rooms & equipment
schedule staff
have key users have access to make changes to any schedule
have all users able to view all schedules
(exporting to outlook would be nice too)

Assuming money is no object (we'll decide a budget for this later), does anyone have suggestions? Or a good resource for reviewing scheduling software?

depending on what field of medcine this is for, very good compaines that make this kind of software include Dentrix, Kodak, and Patterson Dental.
You're best friend is google. I would do a google search and most of the top compaines offer online demos where a customer rep will walk you through all of the features so you can see if it is the right software for your practice or not.