Company Vision

In 2001, Robert Neal, CPA started a project to look at sources of healthcare business intelligence information that could be used to make better decisions and project the business trends in healthcare.  This project resulted in the business venture to develop an internet and desktop based product to use publicly available information to improve business decisions in healthcare.  Provider Almanac contains provider based information for the past five years.  Population Almanac containes population information for the past thirty years.  Healthcare Almanac contians summary information from the two almanacs and projects the healthcare financial information for the next fourteen years.  The big question in healthcare today is the estimated impact of the baby boomer generation on healthcare utilization and revenue.  Every healthcare provider is expecting increased demand for services.  The goal of the almanacs is to provide information about the future of healtcare and an accurate analysis of past performance.

Company History

Healthcare Almanac is business intelligence product developed by Robert Neal, CPA.  The business entity for Robert Neal, CPA is Intech Computer Systems, Inc.  that was incorporated in 1986.  Intech Computer Systems is a software development business with a group of software products.

In 1996, Robert Neal, CPA updated a product named Winstat Analyst.  Winstat Analyst performed hospital discharge analysis of UB04/92 for hospitals.  The product's main focus was the analysis of UB04/92 data at the DRG and ICD-9 level.  Over the next five years, the software was extended to a number of states and many features were added to improve the usability of the software.  Many hospitals have used this information to analyze trends in their operation and improve their marketing and business practices.   In 2005, the software is installed in 110 hospitals,  HMOs  and medical device manufactures.

In 2001, Robert Neal, CPA began a project to use the Internet to locate sources of publicly available information.  The goal was to find business information that could be used by the healthcare industry to improve healthcare marketing, public relations, contracting, capacity planning and strategic planning.  There is a large amount of information available from the government but the information is in many formats and difficult to use. One large source of information is the Medicare Cost Reports.  Another large source is the Census Bureau with the census information. There are many sources of additional information that can enhance the healthcare cost information and population information.  Over the next several years, this project continued with the goal of developing a software product resulting in better utilization of healthcare information and development of a healthcare industry strategic plans.  The most important area was to find information for accurate forecasting of population and healthcare utilization.

In mid 2002, a test project was started to develop Healthcare Almanac in a programming language called Visual Foxpro.  Visual Foxpro had a number of limitations related to distributed processing and file size limitations.  Microsoft had just released Visual Studio .Net 2002/2003.  This development environment was the result of 6 years of development by Microsoft.  In my opinion, Visual Studio .Net is the best software development environment to date but is difficult to learn and use.  Microsoft released VS2005 and VS2008 with numerous improvements and today, the .Net programming languages are the best development environment available today. 

In early 2004,  the overall business design of Healthcare Almanac was started and completed by the end of the year.  This design was the definition of the Almanacs.  Information was organized into Provider Almanac, Population Almanac, Patient Almanac, Reference Almanac and Healthcare Almanac.  The Provider Almanac provides the definition of the healthcare industry.  The Population Almanac provides the census or definition of healthcare patients.  The Patient Almanac provides the use rates for inpatient and outpatinet healthcare.  The Reference Almanac provides additional information for DRGs, medical terminology and summary information.  The final almanac is Healthcare Almanac.  This almanac uses the information from the four almanacs to create a forecast of population, use rates, billing rates and projected financial statements. 

In mid 2005, the software development of Provider Almanac was started.  The progress of the project was slow due to the complexity of Visual Studio 2003.  In November 2005, Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 were released by Microsoft Corporation.  All development activity was switched to the new software.  By June, 2006, parts of Provider Almanac was completed and the product was released at the HFMA ANI conference in Orlando, FL with a  small set of features.  The POS data was for Hospitals, SNF, HHA and ESRD.   The Medicare Cost Report data was for Hospials and SNFs.

In 2007, version 2007A and B were released with new data and reporting features were added to Provider Almanac.  The main feature was installation over the internet and access to data over the internet.  The POS reporting was completed for the remaining 11 types of providers.  The UPIN data for physicains was also added to the available data sources.          

In 2008, version 2008A and B were released with the new Cost Reports Compare report with 5 years of comparison.  The Medicare Cost Reports for HHA, ESRD and Hospice were completed. 

In 2009, version 2009A and B were released.  Provider Almanac has the new Summary Reports with Provider Profiles, KPIs and Provider Compare report with 5 years of history for Hospitals, SNF.  If you have read this far, thank you for your interest.  If you have any questions or comments, please email or call.  We always answer the phone and look forward to talking with you.

In 2010, version 2010A and B will be released.  Provider Almanac is substantially complete.  Propulation Almanac will be available in a lmited feature edition before the end of the year.  This will complete the information required for Healthcare Almanac.

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