Benefits of using hospital information system in the Philippines
Paper-based processes, sluggish workflow, dissatisfied patients, tiring staff, and low technology maturity are among the many reasons why Philippines health providers are falling behind.
One common strategy to overcome this is to implement hospital information systems. First, let’s learn what it offers to the Philippines healthcare system:
- It can centralize patient and healthcare data and remove the use of paperwork.
- It can automate administrative tasks such as appointment scheduling, staff assignment, and transferring patient data across departments. Your facility can then provide faster and more timely care.
- It enhances accuracy in diagnosis and treatment.
- It supports meds and equipment inventory management, insurance and billing, finance, and staff management.
- Cost-effectiveness and happier staff.
Challenge of using hospital information system in the Philippines
Despite all the advantage, the implementation of HIS in the Philippines is not easy. A good HIS needs to be localized to serve their patient’s needs and adhere to local regulations. On the other side, most Philippines healthcare facilities don’t have the right IT infrastructure, budget, or talents to fully embrace the use of HIS.
This is why many are skeptical about digital transformation. However, you can outsource your HIS and let the vendor customize it to best suit your requirements. This ensures usability, and you don’t have to extensively invest in IT staff and tools.
Must-have features of a HIS used in the Philippines
Before jumping into choosing a vendor, you need to figure out your requirements and what your HIS should look like to serve the Philippines.
1. Common features
HIS contains lots of sub-modules that you can add or remove, based on your needs, including:
Storing electric medical/health records (EMR/ EHR) instead of paper form and spreadsheets.
- Inventory and distribution management: To track the usage and know when to refill medicine and medical equipment.
- Billing and insurance management: To automate the calculation and reduce the claim denial rate.
- Appointment management: To automatically arrange appointments, track outpatient/ inpatient, assign staff and departments.
- Lab and radiology management: To store test results, image scanning results, and lab research results.
- Analytics & Reporting: Calculate the performance of your healthcare facility.
- Mobile app for patients and doctors to accommodate remote care.
- Other modules such as finance management and human resources management.
2. Specialized features for Philippines healthcare providers
The success of an HIS relies on its localization ability. Using an HIS that is made for Americans or Europeans in the Philippines won’t guarantee usability, and it is not adaptive to your nation’s and patients’ needs.
When identifying your requirements, keep in mind these features:
Language support: Not just Filipino and English, supporting Cebuano, Hiligaynon or other ethic language groups can also be a plus.
Adhere to national healthcare compliance: Besides global standard such as HIPAA, ICD, CDA, or HL7, you should make sure your HIS comply with Philippine Health Information Exchange (PHIE), Department of Health (DOH) Regulations for EMR and software licensing, and PhilHealth for claim processing and health reporting.
eHealth: As the Philippines actively promotes remote health, your HIS should also support e-scheduling, e-consulting, e-appointment, a mapping tool, e-prescription, delivery tracking, and telehealth. These features will help you connect with patients more easily and instantly, especially those from geographically dispersed areas, as the Philippines is an archipelagic country.
High affordability and flexibility: Make sure your HIS fits your budget and still covers all your needed functions. This sure sounds like a dream. One way is to work with Hospital information system providers from the Philippines instead of a global one since they know how to work around the regulations and tight budget. Another way is to outsource your development to a low-cost region such as Vietnam, India, or Malaysia.
What Philippines hospitals should look for in a HIS partner
Now that you know why/ when to have a HIS, what features to build for a HIS, next is how to identify the good one.
- Your HIS should offer a wide range of modules.
- Your vendor should understand all the PhilHealth regulations and know how to precisely use it.
- It’s a huge plus if your HIS can check out all the features mentioned above made specifically for the Philippines. If not, the more, the better.
- If you opt for customizing an HIS, make sure your development vendor has enough IT resources, tools, and infrastructure to build and manage your HIS long-term. You should also check if they are open to signing an NDA, MOA, or SLA. It would be a red flag if they weren’t.
- Ask your vendor about the training program. The lack of training also causes low HIS adoption from staff. They are too busy to figure it out themselves. Meanwhile, there is no one around for support.
- Check for ease of use. Your HIS should be easy to navigate for both staff and patients of all demographics.
Best hospital information system providers in the Philippines
In this list, we choose 10 market leaders for hospital information system in the Philippines. This list includes (1) the top vendors for custom HIS development and (2) providers of the most common HIS or health information system being used in Philippines.
| Company name | Type of HIS | Pricing | Quality Rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Synodus | Customized, packaged solution | $25/hr | 5/5 |
| Cambria | Customized | $25 – $50/hr | 4.3/5 |
| Valuelabs | Customized, packaged solution | N/A | 4.3/5 |
| Flatworld | Customized, packaged solution | $25/hr | 4.7/5 |
| WhiteWidget | Customized | $50 – $99/hr | 4.6/5 |
| Hybrain | Customized, OTS product | $25/hr | N/A |
| Bizbox | OTS product | N/A | N/A |
| Sancysolutions | OTS product | N/A | N/A |
| Comlogikph | OTS product | N/A | N/A |
| Exist | OTS solution with customized | $25 – $49/hr | N/A |
1. Synodus
With over 250 healthcare software developers, Synodus is the leading hospital information system provider in the Philippines and APAC.
We are trusted by over 30 facilities and 10,000 medical staff. We understand the daily struggle of doctors and nurses. Our goal is to leverage the right technology, such as IoT, blockchain, process automation, and data analytics, to improve your operation and quality of care.
We have 2 ways to handle the task:
- Use a packaged solution then customize it here and there to fit your requirement and PhilHealth regulation. This strategy focuses on Cost-efficiency and Fast build.
- We build your HIS entirely from the ground up. This focuses on a high level of flexibility, adaptiveness and scalability.
A HIS we built for our client, serving 5,000 outpatients and 1,700 medical staff daily, has boosted 300% revenue increase, cut $70K per month on administration and increased patient satisfaction by 30%.
The best HIS is the one that is made for you and serves your patients. For this, our legal experts deeply research the Philippines standards, ensuring the HIS complies with PHIE, DOH, PhilHealth Accreditation, HIPAA, ISO, and HL7.
We guarantee a HIS with:
- Automatic patient scheduling and queuing
- EHR/ EMR/ patient and health data management
- Inventory and distribution management
- Billing, claim and insurance modules
- Mobile app for doctors and patients
- Laboratory, Radiology, Picture (x-ray, scanning result) management
- Telehealth and telemedicine (e-prescription, e-health, e-consultation, tracking app, QR code scan, mapping tool, e-appointment and many more)
- Smart analytics
- Finance/ Human resources management
2. Cambria
This is one of the most reliable IT outsourcing and hospital information system companies in the Philippines. With over 40 years of experience, Cambria has grown into a large technology company with offices in the Philippines and the United States.
They provide full-cycle development services and staff augmentation solutions. With 200 developers, Cambria gives you the best solutions within budget, from custom development to QA/Testing.
In healthcare, they can build automatic clinical and administrative systems, such as HIS, EHR, and patient portals, for healthcare facilities and ensure compliance with privacy standards.
3. Valuelabs
Valuelabs is a leading global technology company specializing in digital transformation and product development. The company has offices in the Philippines and many other countries, reaching 7,000 employees in total.
Valuelabs leverages innovative technologies—such as AI and ML, cloud, and mobile—to gain elasticity, agility, and efficiency. They provide customized services for hospitals, clinics, large healthcare systems, surgery centers, and health specialists.
Much like other Philippines health information system providers on this list, Valuelabs also offers a wide range of sub-modules, including:
- Patient tracking
- EMR/ EHR
- Insurance and claim management
- Clinical data management
- Lab informatics
The company seamlessly integrates the module into the customer’s legacy system or, if necessary, replaces it with a brand-new system.
4. Flatworldsolutions
Having 20 years of market presence, Flatworld is a prime name for IT outsourcing, business consulting, IT-managed services, and BPO in the Philippines. They have served over 18,000 clients with a team of 5,000 employees across India, the Philippines, Malaysia, the US, and the UK.
The company offers highly secure and strictly HIPAA-compliant healthcare development. Their IT experts have a profound understanding of local regulations and regularly keep themselves abreast of any updates.
As a hospital information system provider in the Philippines, here’s what you can build with them:
- Medical billing software
- Designing and managing your healthcare information system
- EMR/ EHR software
- Clinical documentation improvement
- Claim processing software
- Healthcare data analytics
- Medical ERP
5. WhiteWidget
This award-winning IT agency operates in Manila and Hong Kong and primarily serves clients across the Philippines and North America. White Widget‘s team provides web development, mobile development, cybersecurity, AI, and machine learning services in many fields.
To build a hospital information system, they offer a wide range of HIPAA-compliant applications, which you can assemble to make a comprehensive system match your needs, including:
- Mobile apps for patients, doctors, and partners.
- EHR
- Telehealth solution
- AI and analytics solutions for research, imaging diagnosis, and more.
- Integration with healthcare IoT and wearables.
- Patient notification and scheduling system.
6. Hybrain
Hybrain is honored to have been chosen as a Philippine delegate to attend many international conferences held in the country.
The company provides complete comprehensive solutions and competitive prices to clients. They are a one-stop-shop for customized and off-the-shelf health information system examples in the Philippines:
- Hospital Management (HIS)
- Inventory Management (MMS)
- Human Resources (HRIS)
- Hospital Accounting (AMS)
- Fixed Assets (FAMS)
- Clinic Management (CMS)
- Electronic Health Records (EHR)
- PhilHealth Claims Portal (PHIC)
Hybrain invested heavily in its core product, MEDtrix, to gain a competitive advantage in digital transformation for the healthcare sector. MEDtrix is a fully integrated HIS that can meet most healthcare organizations’ requirements. It is available as a full package or with on-demand features.
7. Bizbox
Bizbox is among the leading hospital information systems used in the Philippines. They are trusted by over 3000 customers, including small to major healthcare providers of the region.
Bizbox is an accredited Health Information Technology Provider (HITP), eClaims certified on the Case Rate System, and accredited by DOH in compliance with the Department of Health’s EMR requirements. Bizbox Telemedicine is now verified as part of DOH’s third-party service provider.
Their hospital information system can:
- Detect duplicate registration
- Automate SMS notification
- Manage inventory and distribution
- Manage patients and hospital data
- Build patient kiosk
8. Sancysolutions
Much like Bizbox, Sancy is an off-the-shelf hospital information system in the Philippines, Malaysia, and Pakistan, but to make themselves stand out, they also offer solutions specifically for patients.
Here are their 4 outstanding products:
- DigitalSENSE is a modern and comprehensive hospital information management system that has 14 core modules and 14 supplementary modules. It is HL7, DICOM, ICD-10, SNOMED CT compliant and has supported over 200 hospitals over the last ten years.
- labSENSE is a modern Laboratory information management system that digitalizes laboratory functions
- rehabSENSE is Integrated Rehab Information System (IRIS)
- clinicSENSE Clinical Management System digitizes the clinical and commercial processes of clinics
9. Comlogikph
Comlogikph is another top health information system being used in the Philippines since 1999. The company has cooperated with over 200 hospitals and over 5,000 doctors, receiving over 20 awards and certifications for the robust system.
The Hospital Information & Management System is a comprehensive system that meets the needs of all hospital levels:
- DOH Certified
- PhilHealth Certified
- Online PF Entry and Monitoring
- Multi-Warehouse Inventory and Suppliers Management
- Expiry & Reorder Alerts
- Patient Satisfaction Survey System
10. Exist
Having over 100 employees in the US and the Philippines, Exist is among the first adopters of Java open-source software. This makes them stand out, as the technology is best for building highly scalable software.
Yet, unlike other health information system examples in the Philippines on this list, they mainly focused on developing off-the-shelf healthcare solutions, with a small level of customization:
- Medcurial Clinic Management System: A web-based application that supports the full business cycle and administration of clinic with ease.
- Medcurial Electronic Medical Records: The First DOH NCR-Certified EMR Software integrated with patient portal and Telemedicine.
- MERX Hospital Information System: An advanced care platform with both operational & clinical information management.
Wrapping up
Understand how health information system is being used in the Philippines helps you plan the approach and strategy for your facility. We hope that from our list of the top Philippines hospital information system vendors, you can choose the one that fit most.
