.KEYWORD roistories
.FLYINGHEAD PALMPOWER ANALYSIS
.TITLE Investing in Palm handhelds: readers tell their own stories of ROI results
.FEATURE
.SUMMARY In trying to get a solid handle on the Return on Investment issue for Palm handhelds, Editor-in-Chief David Gewirtz realized that getting ROI accounts directly from readers, in their own words, would be an excellent way to showcase ROI. In this article, he shares the empirical evidence he’s gathered from a number of PalmPower Magazine Enterprise Edition readers just like you.
.AUTHOR David Gewirtz
.BEGIN_SIDEBAR
This issue of PalmPower Magazine Enterprise Edition is devoted to an important issue: the Return on Investment of Palm handheld computers. We’ve devoted three feature articles to this comprehensive PalmPower Analysis. Be sure to read all three to get the best understanding of this complex but exciting issue.
.END_SIDEBAR
I’ve been trying to get a good, solid handle on what I’ve been calling "the Return on Investment issue" for Palm handhelds for quite a while. I’ve been working with formulas, spreadsheets, and even went so far as to dust off my old financial modeling textbook. The challenge is that ROI (Return on Investment) is going to be different for every application. Because there are so many applications, there is no one right answer. Quite frankly, it had me more than a little stumped.
Then, a visit to my chiropractor finally helped me figure out the right way to explore this issue. I visit Dr. James Lang every other week, and he yanks on my neck and twists my spine, all with the intent of overcoming the damage I do to myself when I write too many of these articles. Being the control freak that I am, whenever he’s about to do a neck yank, I tense up.
This doc’s pretty good at his job, so he often tries to distract me by asking me to wiggle my feet or tell him about work. On the particular visit in question, I was working on the set of ROI articles that you’re reading in this issue. In answer to his first question, "What’re you doing at work?" I told him I was doing a big writing project for PalmPower’s Enterprise Edition.
"Oh, about what?" he asked.
"Well, I’m trying to show our readers how to figure out their Return on Investment if their company buys Palm handhelds."
All of a sudden, the neck-yanking thing was forgotten.
"I love mine," he said. "I use it all the time."
Uh oh. I was of two minds about this revelation. On one hand, as a dutiful writer, I was intrigued. On the other hand, like the day I discovered my relatives had email, I had pretty much figured that the neck-yanking and spine-twisting world was pretty far removed from the Palm Economy. I decided to listen to my better angels and learn more.
"Oh, really?" The phrase "Oh, really?" is a fabulous interview tool. It also works well on a date. When you ask "Oh, really?" it sounds like you care and want more information, but the reality is you have no real idea what to say next. The cool thing is that the recipient of an "Oh, really?" almost always takes the ball and runs with it.
Dr. Lang certainly did. Now, since at that moment he basically had me in a headlock, I was a seriously captive audience. I also didn’t have a pen or paper or the leverage to take notes. After he did one of those elbow-down wrestling drops on the middle of my back, I offered to call him later and conduct a more proper interview. And that’s just what I did. I’ll tell you his story a little later in the article.
As I thought more about Lang’s story, I realized that getting ROI accounts directly from readers, in their own words, would be one really good way to showcase ROI. It’s much more empirical, meaning it’s not derived from a formula. Instead, it’s all based on real experiences. Since we have one of the best laboratories for Palm analysis and research here at PalmPower’s Enterprise Edition–in the sense that we’ve got a ton of you readers, all with your own experiences–it seemed to make the most sense to tap that resource in my quest for the holy grail of ROI knowledge.
That, in fact, is just what I’ve done here in this article. I posted requests for stories on our News Page and selected some that I thought were most interesting. First, I’ll start with Jim Lang’s story about how he’s saving money and time. Then you’ll hear from a doctor who won’t put a price on his Palm handheld, other than that he’s convinced it’s helped him save lives. You’ll hear from a number of business people who have quantified some data, a dentist who trimmed a 30-minute process down to 3 minutes, and even a retired fellow who’s using Palm handhelds to help out with disabled veterans.
First, let’s start with my favorite neck-yanker.
.H1 Saving paperwork and saving money
Dr. James V. Lang, D.C., like many other medical professionals, has to take a lot of time preparing paperwork for insurance companies. Often, when processing a claim, insurance companies require what are called SOAP (Subjective Objective Assessment and Plan) notes. These are daily treatment notes and observations for each patient.
Because, when done by hand, taking SOAP notes was a pain, it didn’t get done for all patients. Full SOAP notes were only taken for those who were likely to need an insurance reimbursement, and more simplistic notes were taken for those patients who didn’t have insurance. Worse, on the occasions that the insurance companies requested SOAP notes, preparing them was a challenge. Rushed notes were taken in the middle of the doctor’s day, between patients, and usually were in poor handwriting, very cryptic, and difficult to decipher. Yet they had to be completely rewritten and retyped. It would often take a free afternoon to an entire day to do this work. And we know how many free days most practicing doctors have available.
Lang bought a Palm handheld and found a product called Auto-Doc (at http://www.auto-doc.com), which captures SOAP note data, including change findings, ranges of motion, findings of X-rays, and so forth. Now he downloads a schedule of patients into the Palm handheld. After patient visits, he picks up his handheld and simply by pointing and tapping in the Auto-Doc program, he selects the answers that describe treatment for each of his patients. So now he can keep detailed notes for all his patients, and not shortchange those without insurance. When it’s time for a report to the insurance company, a simple HotSync brings the data back to his PC, and he can generate the report.
Lang estimates he cut paperwork by about 75%, and the entire system paid for itself in about a year. In fact, he reports that his income on cases that require paperwork increased by 15% because, with better documentation, he’s getting paid more by the insurance companies for items that previously might have been too indecipherable to report.
Want to know what he says the true benefit is? According to Lang, because his reports are now so much better, the insurance company is more confident of his findings and requests reports far less often.
And now, let’s look at what our readers had to say
