Information Systems

We create and help implement customized solutions tailored to you.

Health Care Program Advisors assists clients in planning and managing the deployment of information systems to support healthcare operations, helping them achieve an appropriate balance between fiscal prudence and operational need. The key to our success is creating the right balance between internal resources, vendor reliance, and the use of outside services, including the use of tactical outsourcing.

Our information services are very extensive, and no two clients are alike. We customize our offerings to your organization’s needs, as we’re here to customize solutions that solve your specific problems.

Information Systems Strategic Planning

Program Advisors customizes a system planning approach to your culture by assessing historical approaches to business planning, capital planning, and systems planning. This spans from high-level technology and systems strategy to identifying and prioritizing tactical initiatives. The planning process is facilitated by Program Advisors’ senior systems professionals, who have decades of experience in this space.

Vendor Evaluation & Selection

Program Advisors can complete a needs assessment and requirements definition for each client. The needs assessment and requirements definition will go toward better understanding your business, its challenges, and what potential solutions we can provide. While not entirely inclusive, these assessments and definitions can include the following:

  • Assess strategic objectives for the analytics program.
  • Evaluate current analytics capabilities and current state clinical and business platforms for analytics capacity.
  • Formalize business and technical requirements.
  • Complete gap analysis for current state versus future state functionality needs.
  • Understand budgetary constraints.
  • Assist in creating a request for proposal or another bid request document.

The vendor analysis portion of this service looks at every aspect of the client’s relationship with each of its vendors. What are their strengths? Where are they lacking? Some of what we provide in this process includes the following aspects:

  • Review vendor responses and complete detailed vendor analysis (including functional and technical fit, cost, and risk assessment).
  • Create a vendor prioritization and/or shortlist.
  • Identify critical success factors.
  • Facilitate system demonstrations.
  • Facilitate the selection of finalist(s).
  • Ensure the entire evaluation process is efficient and easy-to-manage.
  • Perform implementation readiness assessment.
    • Review and make recommendations on staffing requirements.
    • Develop all-inclusive financial and investment models.

Contract Negotiation & Renegotiation

Navigating legal jargon found within contract negotiations is daunting, yet effectively doing so is vital to the success of your operation. Program Advisors has the expertise to help. Our contract (re)negotiation services include, but are not limited to, the following:

  • Work with client legal counsel to develop a negotiation strategy.
  • Manage the negotiation process and timeline on behalf of the client.
  • Identify and facilitate prioritization of contract, technical, and business issues.
  • Provide input to the “what’s possible and reasonable” assessment of vendor contract issues.
  • Provide “vendor-facing” negotiation or background support, depending on client needs or preference.
  • Assess established agreements for improvement opportunities (cost and/or terms).

Merger and Acquisition Services

Knowing when to capitalize on opportunities to expand your business is one of the more challenging aspects of the entire merger and acquisition process. Program Advisors goes deep into the weeds of both your business and the potential asset. As you’ll see below, we leave no stone unturned, providing the client with the knowledge it needs to make an informed decision. Here’s how it works:

  • First, we assess the opportunity.
    • We review staffing (current state versus combined state) to quantify potential labor cost reduction.
      • As a result of commodity services consolidation.
      • Resulting from management integration.
      • As an outcome of eliminating redundant platforms.
    • We evaluate technology and vendor overlap (common suppliers, as well as technology, overlap with disparate suppliers).
    • We review strategic systems plans to identify common initiatives and initiatives which might no longer be necessary or of the same scale with the merger.
    • We assess technology areas for opportunities to combine vendors and efforts to drive out costs (such as telephony, PACS, data networks, etc.).
  • We document short- and long-term portfolio and infrastructure consolidation plans, including:
      • Strategic systems plans.
      • Cost savings.
      • Required investments.
      • IS Department structure and staffing.

Systems Function Cost Effectiveness and Improvement

Are your current systems operating as efficiently and effectively as they could be? Do you need to find a new service or system, or can you optimize the one you currently employ? These are questions we can help answer. The process of changing over systems can be overwhelming. Program Advisors possesses the industry knowledge and expertise necessary to ensure your systems are where they need to be. If we discover they’re outdated or are incapable of fulfilling your needs, we can help provide quality solutions to increase efficiency. Our services include:

  • Assessing labor and non-labor systems investments.
  • Utilizing proprietary and market-available benchmarks to assist with identifying improvement opportunity.
  • Assisting with the development of plans and strategies for reducing cost.

Systems Related Compliance Planning and Monitoring

Program Advisors provides subject matter expertise on systems-related regulatory programs. We conduct research and analysis on a request basis for client-specific situations, and we develop programs and plans to ensure compliance with federal and state systems-oriented programs.

Project Services

Implementing a new system is a challenge that’s particularly unique to those in the healthcare space. Program Advisors is here to guide our clients through what can feel like a minefield of hazards at every turn. While every project is unique, Program Advisors utilizes a consistent process for our project services.

    • We’ll steward pre-implementation planning for major systems and analytics implementations (i.e., charter, work plan, and budget development).
    • We provide senior-level advisory oversight of projects by providing “arms-length” advisory to large scale projects (project “quality assurance”).
    • Program Advisors leads the project and program management, including:
      • Managing major systems implementation projects on behalf of clients.
      • Providing team leads and senior-level analysts to implementation projects.
    • Our project remediation does the following:
      • We assess in-flight projects for reliability, predictability, and risk.
      • We can fix projects which have gone astray (over budget, past timelines, or not meeting expectations).
        • Pre-live
        • Post-live