RPA adoption in the healthcare industry
Tags: webdev, productivity, datascience, performance
Published: 2023-09-22 14:48:02

_This post is a quick overview of an Abto Software’s [blog article](https://www.abtosoftware.com/blog/rpa-adoption-in-the-healthcare-industry)._

The modern-day healthcare industry is burdened by standards, rising costs, and unpleasantly high workloads. These factors might degrade the quality of services, negatively affecting medical personnel and patients.

In the healthcare segment, routine processes handled day-to-day require uncompromising data consistency. These include patient registration, onboarding, follow-ups, report generation, medical billing, claim processing, and more.

The mentioned and some more factors are creating the need to implement robotic process automation (RPA) to minimize manual operations and facilitate workflow productivity across different healthcare departments. By transforming resource-intense processes and facilitating regulatory compliance, healthcare organizations might accelerate overall performance, eventually streamlining business revenue.

## RPA application across areas

### Data management

Robotic healthcare process automation might be smoothly integrated to assess and interpret patient records by utilizing natural language processing (NLP), image and video recognition, speech recognition, and other advanced techniques.

For example, RPA solutions can cover:

- Appointment scheduling
- Calendar management
- Patient registration 
- Patient history
- Medical notes
- Insurance information
- Medical billing
- Medical claims

### Document management

Robotic healthcare process automation might be also incorporated to process paper-based documents (insurance documentation, legal agreements, and more) by ingesting those into centralized repositories.

More specifically, RPA software can handle:

- Record scanning and digitization
- Document indexing and categorization
- Digitization of claim forms and associated insurance documentation
- Digitization of consent forms or patient legal agreements
- Capturing information from invoices and statements
- Extracting information from laboratory test results
- Converting paper-based into indexable, searchable formats
- Extracting information from medical research literature

### Appointment scheduling

Appointment scheduling typically involves numerous routines – availability evaluation, slot presentation, appointment scheduling, patient notification, rescheduling, cancellations, and creating appointment reminders. RPA robots can handle these automatically, saving time and cost.

### Self-service check-in

Self-service check-in comes with waiting times, insurance verification, eligibility screening, patient updates. RPA bots can simplify those efficiently, providing better customer satisfaction and retention.

### Infection control

Healthcare RPA might accelerate infection control by covering:

- Triage management
- Protocol management
- Outbreak alerting
- Threshold notification
- Hand hygiene compliance monitoring
- Healthcare associated infections reporting

### Asset monitoring

Healthcare RPA might streamline asset monitoring by handling:

- Asset tracking and localization
- Inventory control and restocking
- Equipment calibration and testing
- Equipment maintenance and servicing

### Claim processing

RPA solutions can automate the transaction between provider and internal revenue cycle management system. By simplifying claim registration, eligibility verification, pre-authorization handling, post-authorization review, and other repetitive processes, healthcare providers eliminate tedious routine processes, which increase employee burnout and decrease customer satisfaction.

### Accounting management

RPA software can transform claims processing from A to Z, including first-line patient inquiries and follow-ups. The bot can recognize and analyze payment details by using optical character recognition (OCR) and input extracted information into the accounting system to register the form and email the information to the involved patient.

## RPA implementation – the moment to implement

Before moving towards automation, you should first understand the benefits and challenges of modernization. Good leadership involves making informed decisions.

Before automating internal processes, you should take time to answer these questions:

- Which specific manual processes are suitable for automation?
- What are the inefficiencies in the selected processes that can be addressed by automation?
- What is the time and cost to integrate RPA software for each identified process?
- What is the potential return-on-investment (ROI) of adopting RPA software?
- How well can the existing software integrate with RPA programs?
- Are there any limitations that must be addressed before implementing RPA programs?
- How will confidential information be handled within the automated processes?
- What measures are needed to comply with acknowledged privacy requirements?
- How can RPA integration potentially impact the roles and responsibilities of employees?
- How will the organization manage communication and collaboration to simplify RPA integration, without affecting overall productivity?
- Does the RPA software of choice provide scalability to accommodate business growth?
- How will the company measure performance and success of the RPA software?

## The benefits of healthcare RPA implementation

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/nilfbmuxi38xw8atibkm.jpg)

### Reduced time and cost

By covering routine processes (data entry), automation solutions eliminate burdensome manual intervention, which accelerates business productivity, saving time and cost, and eventually driving profitability.

### Increased accuracy

By handling daily processes (claim processing), automation software ensures accuracy throughout activities, which streamlines smarter resource-allocation, helping focus on core business objectives.

### Data Interoperability

By leveraging artificial intelligence, healthcare organizations create ecosystems collecting data across sources, which enhances data interoperability and accessibility.

### Smooth workflows

By implementing business automation, healthcare companies create opportunities to optimize every process from registration and scheduling to everyday accounting activities, which transforms customer experience.

## The challenges of healthcare RPA implementation

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/xzlbevkqtyfahk03okd9.jpg)

### Process identification

Incorrectly identified processes to-be-automated might cause:

- Overlooked problems
- Inaccurate prioritization
- Inefficient automation
- Unjustified expenses

### Project coordination 

Unreasoned coordination between employees might cause:

- Incoherent communication and collaboration between departments
- Inadequate alignment of efforts with determined business requirements
- Inefficient utilization of resources
- Unjustified investment

### Management issues

Organizations must prioritize governance, change management, risk management, as well as accountability. Otherwise they might face insufficient governance and accountability over the RPA initiative and performance.

### Infrastructural issues

Companies should establish robust information & technology infrastructures that support seamless integration. Otherwise they’ll probably face inadequate security and compatibility, deficient scalability, and other significant challenges. 

## How we can help

![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/wz4exhcs1mjgu6k1afwz.jpg)

Abto Software can deliver robotic process automation products across industries, no matter the complexity. Our company has the domain expertise to design scalable applications to transform resource-intense routines into easy-to-control, efficient workflows.

Integrate modern-day RPA programs into your day-to-day activities and transform appointment scheduling, and other routine tasks across departments to optimize your performance.

Our expertise:

- .NET development
- ASP.NET development
- Web application development
- Mobile app development
- Cloud services
- Full-cycle custom software development

Our projects:

- Markerless human pose detection for remote physical rehabilitation
- Child abuse tracking, investigation & reporting healthcare platform
- Personal medical device integration for mobile telemedicine application
- RPA platform legacy modernization