Intelligent Tech Channels Issue 32 | Page 31

AFRICA REGIONAL CHANNELS AFRICA industry, it comes as no surprise to see Converge’s enhanced versions of the solution already being adopted by healthcare organisations in other African markets.” Joubert says healthcare is an inherently complex industry. “During the course of their stay, one patient may interact with multiple external healthcare professionals and/or entities, who deliver independent yet interrelated services to the patient,” he said. He adds that patients also have a range of benefit structures from different medical aid schemes, with different pricing mechanisms, which adds layers of complexity. “The key is to deploy a solution that simplifies all of this complexity, allowing a single view of the patient, with high levels of automation and sophistication, freeing up healthcare professionals to spend more time with the patient,” he said. “There are a range of offerings in the market that are very simple to deploy and simple to use, but without the sophistication to address all of these elements effectively, forcing hospitals to throw people towards a system deficiency. Our solution doesn’t ignore these complexities, it simplifies them, with an appropriate level of control, flexibility and ease of use.” With some other countries having a multitude of medical schemes operating, submitting medical aid claims and checking the eligibility of patient benefits for certain procedures or care can be a time-consuming administrative burden without the appropriate solutions in place. “We integrate to Medikredit, a switching company for medical aid claims that has enabled real time eligibility checking, among other rich functionality,” said Joubert. “Healthcare organisations using our solution can quickly check that patient benefits are still intact and that the medical aid will cover the costs. “Once the service is billed, the claim can be submitted to the medical aid scheme immediately and with minimal rejections since the eligibility of the claim was performed beforehand. This integrated approach ensures a dramatically lower claim rejection rate.” Joubert adds that a large part of the co-innovation project focused on reducing the operational complexity inherent within healthcare organisations. “We made use of best practices, but also ensured the system is localised to serve the specific operational needs of African private sector hospitals,” he said. “This was achieved through more than a decade of working side by side with healthcare entities to understand their pains and architect solutions, along with an active inclusion of industry thought leaders through the system enhancement process. “We also extended the standard SAP solution by integrating our own solutions to augment what is already offered, including PatientMyth (a digital patient survey and intervention platform), Impi (a clinical incident management platform), Virtual Forms (a form digitalisation platform) and Triton (an advanced acuity based nursing planning and optimisation solution). “We have partnered and/or integrated with a number of other leading entities including, but not limited to, Cerner, Elsevier and Medikredit. “We are constantly evaluating and integrating other products and partners into our ecosystem to ensure that healthcare providers can source all IT related products and services from one point of accountability. “Our solutions offer simplification and predictability, extending to timeline, budget, appropriate levels of sophistication and standardised levels of care, to cover all permutations of healthcare in Africa.” • INTELLIGENT TECH CHANNELS INTELLIGENT TECH CHANNELS Issue 32 31