Careclues
Building a unified EMR-PMS solution for the healthcare industry
Careclues, a well-known name in the healthcare industry, approached Canvs to build their next EMR solution. The solution had to consist of three major things among the others. Speed. Usability. Simplicity.
Project and its context
Careclues wanted to build a product for the medical industry to help doctors, patients, clinics & hospitals by building an unified PMS and EMR system.
The project was unique in its own way. A unified PMS & EMR system had not previously been thought of. As complex as EMR systems are, we had to ensure it met industry standards and at the same time stood out for its features & usability.
Solving for the challenges
– Clarity of information
– Data presentation
– Intuitive navigation
– Obvious UI paradigms
– Fast accessibility of features
The specific facets that needed to be looked into involved:
Electronic Health Records
For EMR’s, presenting physicians and nurses with a streamlined visual snapshot of medical records could improve readability of content. EMRs lack usability because they have too many complex steps and tasks. The complexity of the interface needed to be simplified into a lightweight user experience.
For the EHR module, the objective was to allow doctors and their assistants to add great documentation, as quickly as possible. Given that doctors and their assistants get interrupted all the time, leading to incomplete records, one of the aspects under focus here, was giving them the ability and providing them an incentive to come back to an incomplete record and finish it. In terms of design elements, this could manifest as persistent notifications or contextual nudges.
EHRs by design allow for comprehensive reporting of patient health information, but not all of that data is equally important or relevant. Thus one of the key areas to focus is on Information Hierarchy. By surfacing important information early and providing the ability to filter and search effectively, the information overload can be managed effectively.
Patient Management System
For the PMS side of the redesign, some of the core functionality under consideration were:
A key focus for the redesign will be to provide a better, more contextual view to doctors and their assistants. For instance, by designing and integrating a Dashboard view, users will have a much better overview of metrics like Efficiency & Revenue, not to mention facilitate better time management by surfacing patient scheduling information. This will help streamline internal workflows and processes.
The Revenue/Earnings module could also do with better data presentation. By visualizing the data instead of presenting it in a tabular format, users will gain a much better understanding of their revenue pattern and could help identify key revenue drivers, possibly allowing them to make better financial decisions.
One the things we need to discuss further concerning the PMS is the Reporting functionality. For a PMS, a robust Reporting functionality is critical. Basis discussion, we could frame this particular problem better.
Specifics on the Team Dynamics
How we went about solving the problem
Through our understanding of the issues in the existing system, user complaints and industry standards, we built a completely new information architecture for Careclues. This architecture comprised of the user transition between PMS and EMR along with other new features to make managing everything easier for all kind of users. Be it a doctor, a clinic or a hospital with staff and resources.
Digitizing the Offline
Our focus was to create a system that follows the offline process of how a doctor assesses a patient and how a clinic or hospital manages their patients, doctors, billing and resources. We built all those components and unified them in the simplest way possible to bring in a seamless experience. Not only that, but we also brought the most used features upfront so that the users of the system can save time and effortlessly use the system.
Multi-User Product Architecture
EMR & PMS Systems are used by many types of users. Doctors with their own practice, Clinics, Hospitals and also by doctors who practice at other clinics, call centers, staffs and so on. The system was therefore designed in such a way that it can be used by all these users without the hassle and with the highest level of operational efficiency.
We had to cater to a wide range of users. Be it a top-down approach where Clinics & Hospitals are managing doctors, patients, billing, staff and resources, to a bottom-up approach where Doctors are managing their own practice, self-run clinics and their schedules with other clinics and hospitals.
Tablet Friendly Design
Doctors prefer to use a tablet device more often than they prefer using a laptop for their practice management. It’s simply more convenient. So we took that feedback and built a system that helped them further with practice management and EMR.
A comprehensive overview
An important checkpoint in the design process was also to have dedicated views that could surface all relevant information for quick access and thereby provide better visibility for all vital information.
We had to focus on the details and accuracy. Where many of the traditional EMR systems failed to take tablet into consideration, we had to ensure tablet was our first priority when we noticed a great deal of tablet usage among doctors and clinics.
Bird’s-eye view of a Practice
The entire product was built in a fashion such that a user having master access could traverse through every aspect of the clinic and do a health check. A super user doctor could access the full horizon of the clinic functions, what appointments are lined up for the day, how the call centre is functioning, look into patient records, check the subscription status of the clinic, view clinic’s display settings among others.
Doctor Centric View
One of the priorities was to have specific views dedicated for Doctors in order to cater to the needs of doctors managing their own practice, self-run clinics and their schedules with other clinics and hospitals. This would also help provide a provision to update details synchronously on the go.
Staff Centric View
The product needed to accommodate for a wide range of users from differing job roles accessing it. Hence, while we had overviews and doctor specific views, it was also needed to have staff centric views which could enable them to take upon tasks and manage activities using the product.
Hear from the product owner
NISCHAL GAUTAM
ex COO, Careclues
“We are pleased to have partnered with Canvs as their product management approach and execution skills have helped us deliver to our discerning users with one of the best in class healthcare platform. The Careclues platform is a one-stop solution to all healthcare needs such as seeking a doctor appointment or booking health test packages at discounted rates. Careclues is not only informative but also has solutions for one and all at a click of a button.”
Nischal and his team worked with us while we designed the Patient Management System (PMS) and Electronic Health Records (EHR) Product for Careclues.
Results
We built a completely robust and integrated PMS and EMR solution with special focus on efficacy of data presentation and intuitiveness of UI. By redesigning the modules from ground up, we ensured to avoid any unwanted sections that would complicate the flow.
We know that well designed and aesthetic interfaces are as much of an incentive to use a product as bad user experience is to being a blocker. By revamping the visual aesthetics with better design artefacts and components, the PMS and EMR modules shall gain a noticeable facelift, which hopefully will play a part in incentivising users to spend more time on the product. Coupled with the strategies to allow users to fill incomplete data as described earlier, the product shall lead to a reduction in errors and incomplete information thereby maximizing the value proposition of using the product.
Careclues
Building a unified EMR-PMS solution for the healthcare industry.
Careclues, a well-known name in the healthcare industry, approached Canvs to build their next EMR solution. The solution had to consist of three major things among the others. Speed. Usability. Simplicity.
Project and its context
Careclues wanted to build a product for the medical industry to help doctors, patients, clinics & hospitals by building an unified PMS and EMR system.
The project was unique in its own way. A unified PMS & EMR system had not previously been thought of. As complex as EMR systems are, we had to ensure it met industry standards and at the same time stood out for its features & usability.
Solving for the challenges
– Clarity of information
– Data presentation
– Intuitive navigation
– Obvious UI paradigms
– Fast accessibility of features
The specific facets that needed to be looked into involved:
Electronic Health Records
For EMR’s, presenting physicians and nurses with a streamlined visual snapshot of medical records could improve readability of content. EMRs lack usability because they have too many complex steps and tasks. The complexity of the interface needed to be simplified into a lightweight user experience.
For the EHR module, the objective was to allow doctors and their assistants to add great documentation, as quickly as possible. Given that doctors and their assistants get interrupted all the time, leading to incomplete records, one of the aspects under focus here, was giving them the ability and providing them an incentive to come back to an incomplete record and finish it. In terms of design elements, this could manifest as persistent notifications or contextual nudges.
EHRs by design allow for comprehensive reporting of patient health information, but not all of that data is equally important or relevant. Thus one of the key areas to focus is on Information Hierarchy. By surfacing important information early and providing the ability to filter and search effectively, the information overload can be managed effectively.
Patient Management System
For the PMS side of the redesign, some of the core functionality under consideration were:
A key focus for the redesign will be to provide a better, more contextual view to doctors and their assistants. For instance, by designing and integrating a Dashboard view, users will have a much better overview of metrics like Efficiency & Revenue, not to mention facilitate better time management by surfacing patient scheduling information. This will help streamline internal workflows and processes.
The Revenue/Earnings module could also do with better data presentation. By visualizing the data instead of presenting it in a tabular format, users will gain a much better understanding of their revenue pattern and could help identify key revenue drivers, possibly allowing them to make better financial decisions.
One the things we need to discuss further concerning the PMS is the Reporting functionality. For a PMS, a robust Reporting functionality is critical. Basis discussion, we could frame this particular problem better.
Specifics on the team dynamics
How we went about solving the problem
Through our understanding of the issues in the existing system, user complaints and industry standards, we built a completely new information architecture for Careclues. This architecture comprised of the user transition between PMS and EMR along with other new features to make managing everything easier for all kind of users. Be it a doctor, a clinic or a hospital with staff and resources.
Digitizing the Offline
Our focus was to create a system that follows the offline process of how a doctor assesses a patient and how a clinic or hospital manages their patients, doctors, billing and resources. We built all those components and unified them in the simplest way possible to bring in a seamless experience. Not only that, but we also brought the most used features upfront so that the users of the system can save time and effortlessly use the system.
Multi-User Product Architecture
EMR & PMS Systems are used by many types of users. Doctors with their own practice, Clinics, Hospitals and also by doctors who practice at other clinics, call centers, staffs and so on. The system was therefore designed in such a way that it can be used by all these users without the hassle and with the highest level of operational efficiency.
We had to cater to a wide range of users. Be it a top-down approach where Clinics & Hospitals are managing doctors, patients, billing, staff and resources, to a bottom-up approach where Doctors are managing their own practice, self-run clinics and their schedules with other clinics and hospitals.
Tablet Friendly Design
Doctors prefer to use a tablet device more often than they prefer using a laptop for their practice management. It’s simply more convenient. So we took that feedback and built a system that helped them further with practice management and EMR.
A comprehensive overview
An important checkpoint in the design process was also to have dedicated views that could surface all relevant information for quick access and thereby provide better visibility for all vital information.
We had to focus on the details and accuracy. Where many of the traditional EMR systems failed to take tablet into consideration, we had to ensure tablet was our first priority when we noticed a great deal of tablet usage among doctors and clinics.
Bird’s-eye view of a Practice
The entire product was built in a fashion such that a user having master access could traverse through every aspect of the clinic and do a health check. A super user doctor could access the full horizon of the clinic functions, what appointments are lined up for the day, how the call centre is functioning, look into patient records, check the subscription status of the clinic, view clinic’s display settings among others.
Doctor Centric Views
One of the priorities was to have specific views dedicated for Doctors in order to cater to the needs of doctors managing their own practice, self-run clinics and their schedules with other clinics and hospitals. This would also help provide a provision to update details synchronously on the go.
Staff Centric View
The product needed to accommodate for a wide range of users from differing job roles accessing it. Hence, while we had overviews and doctor specific views, it was also needed to have staff centric views which could enable them to take upon tasks and manage activities using the product.
Hear from the product owner
NISCHAL GAUTAM
ex COO, Careclues
“We are pleased to have partnered with Canvs as their product management approach and execution skills have helped us deliver to our discerning users with one of the best in class healthcare platform. The Careclues platform is a one-stop solution to all healthcare needs such as seeking a doctor appointment or booking health test packages at discounted rates. Careclues is not only informative but also has solutions for one and all at a click of a button.”
Nischal and his team worked with us while we designed the Patient Management System (PMS) and Electronic Health Records (EHR) Product for Careclues.
Results
We built a completely robust and integrated PMS and EMR solution with special focus on efficacy of data presentation and intuitiveness of UI. By redesigning the modules from ground up, we ensured to avoid any unwanted sections that would complicate the flow.
We know that well designed and aesthetic interfaces are as much of an incentive to use a product as bad user experience is to being a blocker. By revamping the visual aesthetics with better design artefacts and components, the PMS and EMR modules shall gain a noticeable facelift, which hopefully will play a part in incentivising users to spend more time on the product. Coupled with the strategies to allow users to fill incomplete data as described earlier, the product shall lead to a reduction in errors and incomplete information thereby maximizing the value proposition of using the product.