Pharma & Healthcare

Healthcare Law Compliance System

For a leading US based pharmaceutical company, the requirement was to integrate HLC compliance standards in to the present processes to take care of current and future regulatory norms.

Client believes that healthcare compliance should be achieved by integrating compliance into business operations, not by adding additional steps to existing processes. Client also wanted a technology framework to integrate these compliance standards in to the present processes. The need was to design a new system to incorporate the regulatory norms and integrate it with the client's present processes.

Analysts from Noesys took up the challenge to study and analyze the regulatory requirements. Detailed study of regulations under the U.S. Healthcare Law was carried out. The domain and processes of the client were studied to identify the impact of the regulations on them. Additionally, current IT systems that supported the business process were studied in detail.

Further interaction and interviews with the users and experts of the regulatory system provided useful insights. This helped the team to do a Gap Analysis by identifying the shortcomings in the current systems and areas where compliance is a must.

Subsequently, Analysts documented the Business Interaction Model which depicts the information exchange between various user groups and departments. Further Process Models were drawn for the current business processes and future processes once compliance system is introduced. The entities present in the domain were identified and the relationships between them were mapped. The Analysts also worked in tandem with the design team by identifying business, data and integration services for building a framework based on Service Oriented Architecture.

Results

Based on our findings and recommendation, objectives of the new system were charted out and the design team was able to come up with architecture for the new compliance engine that would be the heart of the system and that would integrate with the other peripheral systems of the client.

Challenge

Studying the US Pharma regulatory framework Identifying gaps in current IT systems and business processes with respect to compliance Introducing compliance through compliance system designed on services framework. Involved in defining and documenting domain models, information model, business process – current and future, use cases and business services.

Online Prescription Management

The client is a leading prescription management and drug information service provider in US.

Their present system of managing the prescription online, though effective, was based on old technology platform. The client was unable to leverage total advantage of the effective online application. The task was to retain the functionality and logic of the system and rebuild it on the new technology platform.

The online prescription management system is very critical for the client. All its mail orders are processed online. The project involved the study of the present system to understand its functionality. Since there was limited in-house expertise, Domain Experts and Business Analysts from Noesys were involved to study the behavior and derive the functionality.

Reverse Engineering methodologies were used to distill the processes contained in the present system. Use Case documents were prepared to model the processes involved and enhancements recommended to the present processes. Domain modeling was carried out to map the entities and the interactions between them. The business logic was redesigned after the detailed study and modeling.

The Reverse Engineering process also gave out dependencies, technical issues and areas of improvement at the system level. The team then identified various services that can be made reusable in the new system.

Designing a user friendly interface for the system was an important element. Noesys designed the User Interface prototype with help of Use Cases to iron out any flaw in the flow of navigation. Design documents were explained to the development team for building the UIs.

Results

The client was very pleased by the elaborate and thorough requirements documentation prepared by our analysts. The functional and technical recommendations presented are to be incorporated by the client in the development phase.

Challenge

The work environment was highly challenging with Limited interaction with the client for understanding the requirement. Sole dependency on the applications to derive domain knowledge and process flows. Restricted Access to application with many of the modules not executable. No in-house experts on Out-dated or unused applications

Tasks Accomplished

Domain Model Business Use Case Inventory Use Case Model & Detailed use cases Process flow / Activity Diagrams Sequence Diagrams Architecture Diagram Detailed Performance Metrics Recommendations

Transcription Management System

The client is a leading healthcare firm in US which provide an IT system that integrates the clinical and financial applications of hospitals on single platform. The client has developed itself as a company that develops, sells and supports integrated clinical and financial hospital information systems and services. One such system which they were using was The Transcription Management System which allows users to interface MS Word Documents and Result reporting to create various transcription documents. The existing application was a very old legacy application which had its own limitations. Client wanted us to study the application and prepare requirements for the new application to be built.

The Transcription Management System was very crucial in providing transcription documents of Medical Records and Orders for the patients in the hospital. The project involved the study of the present system to understand its functionality, behavior and detail out the existing features and identifying new possible features that would help the client improve their present process.

Reverse engineering methods were used to analyze the structure, function and operation of the system. Detailed documents for Feature lists of the existing system and new features identified were created. Process flow diagrams were prepared to represent the processes involved in the present system and use cases to model these processes and enhancements recommended to the present processes. Domain modeling was carried out to map the entities and the interactions between them. The business logic was redesigned after the detailed study and modeling. HL7 standards were implemented to send/receive messages and documents between two different systems and HIPPA compliance were implemented to ensure the security policy of the healthcare industry. The Reverse engineering approach helped the analysts to find the gaps at various levels and show the areas of improvement. The team was able to find out the present features that need to be modified to address the latest changes in the technology.

Designing a visual User Interface prototype for the new system was a very important part of the project. Our team designed the UI Prototype that best described the flow of navigation in the system.

Results
The client was very pleased by the elaborate and thorough requirements documentation prepared by our analysts. They appreciated the commitment showed by our analysts through out the project by analyzing each and every problem, discussing it with the clients. They were really impressed by the innovative visual prototypes created by our team for the proposed application.

Challenge

The work environment was highly challenging with Limited interaction with the client for understanding the requirement. Time constraints to access the application. Many parts of the application were not accessible since it was on production. Limited information in the documents provided. No in-house experts on Out-dated or unused applications

Tasks Accomplished

Detailed Feature List and Use Case Inventory of existing system. Identifying New Features Domain Model And Process model Use Case Model & Detailed use cases Mapping of Process flows and existing rules for platform migration Activity/ Sequence Diagrams Visual Prototypes of proposed Systems Recommendations

Surgical Outcomes Analyzer

The client is a leading healthcare firm in US which helps Hospitals improve their quality of service through their effective analysis solutions.

The client has a group of hospitals and healthcare units for whom they help improve their quality of service. They wanted a web based system to implement their analysis methods on the surgical outcomes provided by different hospitals. The system was supposed to handle all the data related to a patient who has undergone surgery right from the admission of the patient till he discharged or died.

The Surgical Outcomes Analyzer system had a key role to play analyzing surgical outcomes of many different hospitals. The project involved the study of methods they use to analyze the surgical outcomes, understand how they get the data from other hospitals, extracting the requirements of the system from the stakeholders, preparing the detailed requirements documents and communicating these requirements effectively to developers who were involved in developing this application. The system was aimed at implementing client’s proven solutions for identification of crucial outcomes of the surgery within the existing work flows, Hospital Information System (HIS) and Electronic Medical Record (EMR) of the hospitals which reduced the costly new HIS and EMR and minimized work flow changes.

Scrum model was used to develop the application which is an agile method of developing software. Use Case documents were prepared to model the processes involved. Domain modeling was carried out to map the entities and the interactions between them. The business logic was designed after the detailed study and modeling. Addressing all kinds of clarifications to the developers throughout the development of the system, right from UI design to database design and business logic to system flows.

Scrum model increased flexibility and was able to build system that was responsive to changing requirements found through out the development of the system. At the end of each sprint, we thoroughly evaluated the system built and ensured that the requirements of the client were met to their satisfaction.

The client was very pleased by the elaborate and thorough requirements documentation prepared by our analysts. They appreciated the commitment showed by our analysts through out the project by analyzing each and every problem, discussing it with the clients and communicating the same effectively to the development team.

Challenge

The work environment was highly challenging with Limited interaction with the client for understanding the requirement. Challenging timelines at each sprint of the project to deliver. Frequent changes in the requirements of the client. Limited knowledge of International medical data transfer standard (HL7) and other medical analogies.

Tasks Accomplished

Domain Model Business Use Case Inventory Use Case Model & Detailed use cases Process flow / Activity Diagrams Sequence Diagrams Architecture Diagram Detailed Performance Metrics Recommendations Test case reviews

IT infrastructure

Avigna, a US based Pharmaceutical company was setting up its manufacturing operations & R&D lab in India. At Noesys, we worked with Avigna's team to setup their operations in India by defining their IT infrastructure and procuring hardware from SI. We defined software requirements for running their operations and choosing a suitable software package amidst various ready packages available. Noesys works as part of the implementation team ensuring Avigna's business model and specific needs are successfully implemented by the software vendor team.

Supporting Infrastructure

PeopleHealth is a health consulting and management organization offering clients a portfolio of integrated health management solutions. PeopleHealth provides customized health plans & healthcare programs for corporates, aiding them to maintain a cost effective & healthy and productive environment in the workplace.

Noesys has helped PeopleHealth build a software application to track and score wellness profile of individuals. This solution is a scientific means to measure health status based on various factors like physical attributes, lifestyle practices, etc. Our team has also helped in defining the supporting infrastructure for PeopleHealth to provide healthcare services to the mass market.

Requirements Definition

Professionals from Noesys have been involved in building a system for a prestigious health institute to study HIV patient cohorts and generate observational data on demographics, clinical and general health status, and health outcomes of participating ARV patients. The system also comprehended the effect of ARV Therapy in the African setting. The project entailed :

	Requirements definition using use cases
	High level design documentation based on requirements gathered
	Test strategy, test plan and test specifications