RPA in Healthcare: The health sector saw the need to embrace the transformation quickly, forced by the Covid-19 pandemic to look much more maturely at processes that, until then, had not occupied the center of attention.
For example, telemedicine had been governed by a 2002 regulation and restricted to particular and emergency cases. Even with the constant pressure from the sector for improvement and expansion, this scenario only changed in 2020, with CFM already predicting the severe potential for spreading the disease.
Effectively, this change brought the sector closer to others that had already adopted or were advanced in this journey, bringing the opportunity to adopt even more innovations to optimize the routine of professionals.
This is unexpected: companies that adopt automation processes reap benefits that include greater operational efficiency, cost savings, quality standardization, scale, and much more. Thus, it cannot be denied that this type of optimization for clinics, hospitals, and companies in the field is quite timely.
What can you expect from automation applied to the healthcare context? How does it benefit patients and help in the fundamental mission of preserving lives and the well-being of all? Follow our article!
RPA In Healthcare: 4 Advantages For The Sector
In addition to the general gains mentioned in the introduction – which virtually all organizations can achieve through automation – there are some industry-specific advantages, among which the following are worth noting:
Reliability In Telemedicine
Remote care is more than simply putting doctors and patients in a virtual conference room. Quick access to the patient’s history, previous reports already issued, and exams performed, to name just a few examples, is required. Integrating all these functionalities becomes much easier with automated systems developed for this purpose. In addition, environment stability, recording capability, and integration with cloud platforms help streamline service, as RPA can extract data from one system to take to another and verify information from multiple platforms to identify problems.
Security In Data Manipulation
With automation, the chances of mishandling patient data by human error drop dramatically. This is essential for observing the LGPD, providing more security for the patient, and shielding the company from the consequences of disrespecting the law. The always problematic issue of disallowance with health operators is still worth mentioning, which brings headaches to clinics and hospitals. With RPA, errors in filling out forms and requisitions drop dramatically, reducing operators’ refusals and guaranteeing payments for the procedures performed.
Reduction Of Bureaucracy
A constant problem in the area is not directly related to the clinical part but to the administrative part: authorization of exams and procedures. These processes are bureaucratic and often slow, generating user discomfort and frustration. An efficient way to mitigate these challenges is through automation, taking away the recurring assessments from human analysts, which increases the consistency of decisions made, reduces the chance of mistakes, and significantly reduces the time to release.
For the user, who is already in a distressing situation when he needs medical assistance, this represents enormous help, significantly raising the quality of the service provided by health plan operators. For physicians, similarly, this facilitates the organization of their diagnoses and the adoption of faster solutions for the effective treatment of their patients; still, in the hospital context, applications in RPA help to reduce queues for triage, waiting time for attendance and withdrawal of exams, contributing to reduce patient stress.
An Open Path To Innovation
Deploying RPA can open up many avenues for more automation in the institution. One of the most interesting is related to data processing in the form of big data. Collecting and analyzing large amounts of data makes it possible to see patterns of behavior, anticipate problems, and carry out much more accurate planning of actions, investments, and contingencies.
In addition, with strengthening a digital culture and automation processes, it becomes easier and more natural to think of more advanced tools, such as AI, applied to diagnoses. This differential speeds up and makes treatment more accurate.
These are just a few examples that show how RPA can bring tangible results and direct positive impacts on the lives and health of patients, changing the medical sector scenario for the better.
Automation In Practice: Challenges And Applications In Healthcare RPA
As in other segments, however, implementing RPA in healthcare has its challenges. As it is a market that entered the digital transformation era relatively late compared to others, there is still a lack of a culture of innovation and digitalization – which makes its acceptance and efficient adoption difficult.
Another aspect that should be noted is the possible need for frequent support of the tool. Due to new regulations, you need to consider upgrading the RPA. Still talking about the technical aspects of the solution, it is essential to stress the lack of off-the-shelf options 100% suited to healthcare needs. This makes it necessary to customize the tools to serve this sector, something that requires knowledge and good planning.
Also Read: How Does RPA Create Value For Companies?