Improving Accreditation Signup Session Retention

The Challenge

For over seven years, the non-profit Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care has used a Breakthrough Technologies Open Advantage team as its software development and support department. It began with the transformation of its 100-plus page application form into an online eAPP. But BT’s support has grown to cover many other projects, as well.

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The Solution

To apply for accreditation from the Accreditation Association for Ambulatory Health Care (AAAHC), clinics, doctor’s offices, and medical groups needed to fill out a complex 100-plus page application form and mail it in. Complete forms were frequently mailed back and forth as information was corrected and refined. It was a cumbersome process, complicated by the fact that a Podiatrist’s practice would need to answer different questions than a Proctologist’s.

Seeing the need for more than just a one-and-done project, the AAAHC brought in an Open Advantage team from Breakthrough Technologies. Their task was to transform the paper application into an online eAPP and to provide them with on-going support in a variety of ways.  The eAPP would be based in .NET technology and be designed to integrate with existing systems.

Within the medical industry, AAAHC accreditation is the gold standard for ambulatory health care organizations. The application is the vital first step leading to a possible on-site examination by AAAHC surveyors. The Association’s Certificate of Accreditation verifies that an organization has committed to providing high-quality care by achieving AAAHC Standards. 

Revamping the bulky, multi-page printed Application for Survey into a sleek, user-friendly online eAPP required tight collaboration between AAAHC leaders and the Breakthrough’s business analysis team tasked with developing the design and architecture.  This close partnership – characteristic of Breakthrough’s “discovery” practices – resulted in a seamless development process and an efficient and effective product that allows applicants to upload documents directly through the AAAHC website and submit them to their offices and surveyors.

The online survey solution utilizes a .NET-based application that greatly reduced cost and upgrades security.  The application features tight integration with the existing infrastructure of the AAAHC website; intuitive user management; relevant and timely Association notifications to users; and the ability to monitor, process and export information from other applications.

The eAPP was successfully launched in 2010, followed by an ongoing process of support and refinement. Because of the wide array of health organization types that apply to the AAAHC, new rules on the backend have had to be added to ensure that Dermatology practices are answering the pertinent questions—and not the questions that would pertain to an out-patient cancer treatment center.

In order to accommodate the nuances of different organization requirements, BT makes exceptions to workflow rules and generates new workflow policies. They provide updates, such as in the way credit cards can be used, and the way warning messages are sent to users.

In addition to the on-going support and refinement of the eAPP, the BT Open Advantage team developed a mobile app to locate AAAHC accredited offices on a Google-style map.  They provide hosting services. They developed a Business Intelligence application to generate reports from the database of survey inspection information.  And many other services.

“We have a fantastic relationship with AAAHC,” said Stacie Keller, BT Senior Project Manager. “They have grown to trust us, which is excellent because we really have become expert in their systems. When they want to make a workflow change, they ask our team. We can take those details off their plate so they can focus on the overall product and how it is rolled out to their clients.”

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