The process of archiving healthcare data can be daunting. Aging, quirky applications to deal with. The threat of losing critical data. Unpredictable twists and turns for those who are unprepared.
This is precisely why LDA’s unparalleled experience benefits healthcare IT leaders and their teams.
With more than 350 unique applications retired in the past 20+ years, we’ve pretty much seen it all. Our deep knowledge of healthcare data archiving has led us to create a highly repeatable, proactive methodology that we employ during every system retirement.
Using this methodology as a guide, our operations team has compiled a set of key questions that project managers should ask during an archiving project and the likely sources of the answers. We’ve also included the most common—but avoidable—project mistakes and delays.
Now, we’d like to share this wisdom with you. In the first of a three-part series, we look at the earliest phase of healthcare data archiving: kickoff.
Phase 1: Kickoff
Key questions | Info source | Related mistake | Resulting delay due to… |
|---|---|---|---|
Do data updates need to be made in the archived application? | SMEs | Disagreement over when cutover to the archived system will occur | |
Do you currently have access to the data, or will you need a third-party contractor? | IT | Don’t know the right people to contact in-house | Constrained resources for either internal IT or external extractor |
Who is the contact to access the data? When can our technical team meet with this resource? | IT | Little/no understanding of how complicated it might be to access data | Failure to set up a timely tech meeting
If third-party vendor holds the data, they delay or require payment prior to release |
What is the format of the database (SQL, Oracle version, mainframe)? | IT | If Oracle, version not provided; archiver must build a platform before data can be uploaded | |
What is the size of the database and image repository? | Database administrator (DBA) | Underestimation of the size and/or the time it will take to perform the extract | Extract launch and/or completion lags |
What is your SSO process to add new tokens? | Identity management | ||
Are there change of control restrictions? | PM/CCB | Lack of knowledge delays go-live | |
What is the file signature of scanned documents? | DBA/Extractor | If proprietary, archiver will struggle to read/open documents | |
How soon can you provide a sample of the data? | DBA/Extractor | Rework due to receiving a data set that is corrupt or unreadable | |
Do you intend to generate claim forms from the archived application? | SMEs | Fail to flag this need until latter project phases | UAT hiccup due to unrecognized need; rework needed |