What you want from a vendor, and what you want from Tuesday afternoon
Start with a Tuesday afternoon rather than a demo. Dana has three patients back to back, the front desk is checking in one and checking out another, and the phone rings twice. A patient who had neurotoxin in February is at home, overdue, and has heard nothing. That afternoon is where the growth jobs live: answering the call, timing the comeback, filling the party, reading the week's numbers. Write what you want from the afternoon on one list and what you want from the screen on the other, and keep them apart for the rest of the decision.
The record, the forms, the calendar and the invoices each move differently
| What it holds | Moving it involves | Staying means | Who owns the step |
|---|---|---|---|
| The charts and the consents | An export whose format you confirm in writing, a test import of one record, and an old copy kept for the retention period counsel sets | Untouched; the growth system reads visit dates and writes nothing | Your medical director and counsel, with one person named to check the import |
| Intake and consent forms | Rebuilt in the new system and re-signed where counsel says a fresh signature is needed | Kept as they are | Your clinical lead, with counsel on signatures |
| The calendar | Future bookings re-entered or imported, then reconciled against the old book | The answering layer books into it with the note attached | Priya, with a date for the final check |
| Invoices, packages and balances | Carried over on the terms each patient was sold; what is owed on unused balances confirmed with your accountant | Keep billing where they bill | You, in writing, before any patient is told |
| The phone, the DMs and the comeback | Rebuilt on the new calendar after the overlap | Answered on your number and timed from the visit history | The growth system, handing anything clinical to a provider |
The record is the legal record of care, so it moves last and under rules
Where a practice keeps its charts and signed consents in Pabau, that record is the legal record of care. Moving it is a project with its own rules: retention, format, who may open the old copy, and whether a signature keeps its standing when it changes systems. Your counsel and your medical director answer those before an export runs, and the record moves on its own timetable, after the calendar and the invoices have settled.
Six answers only your practice can give
- Which of your reasons for looking describe the screen, and which describe the afternoon. Count each column.
- How many people chart or take consents in it today, and which of them would work in two systems across the overlap.
- Which numbers you pull from it each month, and whether an export plus a weekly page would give you the same ones.
- What the agreement says about term, notice and export. Read it, mark it, and send it to counsel before any vendor call.
- Where patient information would sit during a move, and who signs the Business Associate Agreement on each side. Confirm with counsel.
- What the vendor's pricing page says for the practice you expect to be in a year.
The growth system around the clinic record, without moving the record
NorthCore builds the growth system on top of the clinic record a practice keeps and moves nothing. Go back to that Tuesday afternoon. The second call is answered on your number while Dana is with the third patient, and it lands on the calendar with the note. The patient overdue since February gets a text in Dana's voice in the week they are due, with two open times, and Priya sees the reply in the thread. Before any of that, the margin on each treatment was read from the invoices, so the membership and the next party are priced from it. The week's numbers land on one page. If you stay on Pabau, the system reads from it. If you switch, it is rebuilt on the new record after the overlap, and nothing is written into a chart in either case. The Answer every patient page shows the answering layer, and the Pabau page shows what stays in the record.
Pricing and HIPAA get a question each
Pricing for any platform is on the vendor's pricing page; the useful habit is to read it for next year's provider count and location count rather than today's. HIPAA is a set of questions to carry to each vendor rather than a verdict a page can give. Ask who signs the Business Associate Agreement, where protected health information lives during the move and afterward, and who holds the old copy. Confirm every answer with counsel.
How to decide in two weeks
- Day one: write the reasons, one per line, and mark each one screen or afternoon.
- Day two: pull the agreement, mark term, notice and export, and send the pages to counsel.
- Days three to seven: ask the vendor in writing for a sample export of one complete patient record, open every file, and ask any vendor you are considering to import it.
- Day eight: cost the overlap in hours for every provider, the front desk and you, and set an end date.
- Day nine: count last month's calls that went unanswered and the patients past their treatment interval. That is the afternoon list.
- Days ten to fourteen: price the afternoon list as a system built around the current record, price the screen list as a switch, and decide each on its own.
What to do next
NorthCore's Answer every patient solution builds the answering layer and the comeback around Pabau or whichever record you keep, scoped in writing before work starts. Results in 90 days, or we keep working until you have them.
