Understanding different veterinary programs
IDEXX Neo
This is a cloud-based veterinary practice management suite used by animal hospitals and veterinary clinics. Key features include appointment management, invoice creation and payment processing (Jonathan, 2019). Through the drag and drop interface, the user of the software can organize patient visits and appointments. Reports also can be easily be generated such as sales, products, services, and clients. The software is offered on a premium basis with a monthly subscription of two hundred dollars.
VETLINKSQL
This SQL based veterinary practice solution helps various types of veterinary practices manage clinics. Key features include appointment booking, reminders, billing, inventory management, e-forms, reporting, a client portal, and cloud backup. It also has a text message tool that aids in terms of receiving notifications about the pet’s appointments. It is designed in a way that one can work on multiple tasks at the same time.
ImproMed Infinity
This is an on-premise veterinary practice management suite for clinics of all sizes. Primary features include treatment plans, patient information tracking, appointment management, billing, invoicing and reporting (ImproMed, 2019). The software can be used to track down the expenses it also has the patient reminders. Thus the users can easily export the data to another program such as Microsoft excel. There is also the mobile application that allows the users to easily access the services from their Smartphone devices.
Company overview
The IDEXX Neo software is made by IDEXX laboratories, Inc. An American enterprise chaired and presided over by Jonathan W. Ayers (Jonathan 2019). IDEXX laboratories were founded in the year 1983 to provide veterinary solutions. The founder of the enterprise was David E. Shaw, the story on how David came up with the idea to start such an enterprise is interesting, it is noted that; while he was commuting weekly to his work station In the 1980s, he felt drained and thus started thinking on how to make his life better, then an idea came into his mind. The idea was to assess the then market environment and find a niche, he found the idea of venturing into animal health and that is how IDEXX was founded and incorporated in 1983. David in an earlier interview said “I saw opportunities in animal health that were not being served well. I got tired of the commute to Massachusetts and liked living in Maine, so I started with the poultry industry, seeing that the initial investment would be small and the time to market shorter.”
IDEXX over the years has been involved with various levels of analysis; creating modern-day solutions in software packages from livestock and dairy, Research and human health and in practice management such as in veterinary medicine management. While VETLINKSQL is produced by Computer Fanatics Limited (CFL) which specializes in providing custom software and hardware solutions to small and medium-sized businesses in the Asia Pacific Region (specifically New Zealand, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong), US and UK, etc. CFL is a wholly New Zealand owned and operated company and has been established since 1989 (over 25 years) with CEO Daven Patel (VetLinkSQL, 2019).
The ImproMed infinity, on the other hand, is produced by Henry Schein Veterinary Solutions, the company is a global animal-health technology and services company dedicated to empowering veterinary practice partners to drive new health and financial outcomes, providing some of the longest-standing veterinary software systems in the world, including AVImark, eVetPractice, and ImproMed. The company was established in 1932 by Henry Schein and Esther Schein as a store from the pharmacy in the Queens area of New York. By the 1940s, the company introduced veterinary products, and by 1985, it became the first-ever company to automate all their services and focusing more on animal health. The software ImproMed infinity together with AVImark is placed under one umbrella, which is the Henry Schein Veterinary Solutions. The company is currently the Global Animal Health Business distributor with Stanley M Bergman as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO).
VETLINKSQL application can be provided as a fully cloud-hosted solution or installed on the premise. This means the software is mobile and can be accessed from anyplace anywhere, this is advantageous because we are living in a digital world. The users are spread over a large area thus ideal for wide-area access. the several hundred users now utilize this software. The brand platform is easy to navigate and therefore easy to use(VetLinkSQL, 2019). It also supports third-party apps and compatible with all the operating systems being used currently, this is an advantage to the clients and the distributors of the brand.
The portability of the software makes every farmer or veterinary prevent or cure deadly animal infections in time. The improMed infinity takes a longer time to reload some data like patient history and also there is no way to create a lock on the initial creation of prescriptions for controlled drugs that have to be filled by a doctor of licensed tech. The other advantage is that it has bundled services that will receive the products that are used in the operation of the software. The shortcomings are that its software is that; farmers with less technological know-how find it difficult to use and maintain, this requires the hiring of technology-savvy technicians in case of a technical error or the system is malfunctioned.
ImproMed as veterinary software is easy to use and keep track of customers, farmers, veterinary doctors and the trend of diseases in the field of animal health, the software is enabled to offer a chat platform, this makes customers questions concerning the services and the products offered get answered promptly. The disadvantage with this software is that the technical support takes time to respond to the issue of the malfunctioned software.
IDEXX Neo just like any other software has one or two shortcomings, one of which is that there is no payment system integrated with the software, meaning that payment must be taken with a separate program, leaving room for errors when entering the payment. The other shortcoming is the inability to create a call back for appointments. The software also lacks the feature of concurrent use by multiple users. On the advantage side, just like the ImproMed, the software is cloud-based, making it accessible from any computer and much more competitive in the market (Jonathan 2019). Most users want to be in a position to access their data remotely without heavy investments on physical servers.
The minimal startup costs that are associated with the software. The use of the software does not require the help of a technician or a specialist this is a good advantage over other software. All of the above three software can be easily accessed via the cloud servers and also they have mobile-based applications to enable the users of the software to be able to access the services easily.
System Recovery and Assistance
Technical Issues are professionally handled by the respective software provider by reaching them, either by dropping them a mail or by getting in contact directly with their main office for assistance.
In comparison on both software, it is significant to note that VETLINKSQL and IDEXX Neo have a cold storage/back up feature, they are downloaded and installed on users’ smartphones, this enables users to comfortably recover lost data in case of system failure (Sourceforge 2019). The users are also at liberty to request their transactional history right from their smartphones. Thus, there’s an absolute recovery of lost data from any internet-enabled computer. With this ownership, the user has full control of the local server, you have your virtual server and your database, which can be backed up within minutes in its entirety and either downloaded or sent to you for full access to every bit of data, files, and images.
However, the improMed infinity is an on-premise software, meaning it is cloud-hosted, one needs not to download it, thus no cloud back up, in case of systems failure/recovery there maybe be little or nothing the company can do. This software is a trademarked product for some companies because they know everything and anything that concerns the software thus they are tasked with the responsibility of providing server and hardware, although this might come with an added fee.
Just like major operating systems, this software can always be improved upon so the companies in charge have to ditch out software updates to correct and take care of hitches and bugs that may exist because this software is used with the internet, it’s only normal to receive updates automatically. Both software is hosted on windows platform and offer periodic software updates but this may be determined by your internet access and strength. (Sourceforge 2019).
This software apart from enhancing practices they have some special features like integrating laboratory results into medical results, giving signals for emergency or reminders through “color coding” features that some may carry, managing an appointment register and keeping accurate inventory amongst other usefulnesses. Laboratory findings/results can be directly imported from the virtual server in the users’ smartphone provided the software is installed on the phone or request it from the developers’ server if the software the services the user requires are from a cloud-hosted software.