Where Tradition and Innovation Meet

Traditional Chinese Medicine is rooted in over 2,000 years of rich history. As with any field, history and tradition are the roots of stability that continues its survival. In addition, every field also needs the growing branches of innovation to progress it into new territories and advances... and this is where tradition and innovation meet.

Traditional Chinese Medicine is ripe for innovation in all areas from herbs to needles to practice management. And as with any change and disruption, it will not be easy and it will be difficult for some to accept. Many will argue that the status quo of doing things have been working for years and that there is no reason to change. However, the change agents realize that the old way of doing business will not take the field to the next level that it needs to get to.

I believe that through technology, there are better ways of caring for patients and measuring patient progress. And all this can be achieved by a stable foundation of a good practice management software that is dedicated to continuous improvement, continuous innovation and the continuous respect of tradition.

I've recently been thinking through the problem of measuring patient progress and came across an amazing example of the out of box thinking and innovation that can happen in acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine. The example is a 2012 FastCompany article entitled, "A New High-Tech Upgrade To Acupuncture Lets You See It’s Working In Real Time" by Elizabeth Woyke. The article talks about an invention by Kiseok Song, a Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) student, who thought up the idea of a smart acupuncture needle, which let's you wirelessly measure electrical activity the needles are stimulating in a patient's muscle. Below is an image of the technology from the article.

This invention by Song is an example of the innovation that can happen with technology in a 2,000 year old field.

In the coming blog posts, I will show some of the innovations that is being built into the Jasmine Practice Management product. If you are an acupuncturist and Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioner, who has ideas for improvements in your own practice, we would love to talk to you! You can email me at mintotsai@jasminepm.com. BlogCatalog Online Marketing

Data Portability: You Own Your Data

Two weekends ago, we attended the Southwest Symposium held here in Austin, TX by the esteemed Academy of Oriental Medicine at Austin (AOMA) school. The event was a great opportunity for us to immerse ourselves in the community and get a chance to talk to practitioners, vendors, various schools and the AOMA staff.

We brought our iPad to the event and showed our prototype to as many people as we could. During one of our demos, a very spirited practitioner, asked a very important question, which is "What happens to my patient data if I no longer want to use your system?"

This was a great opportunity for us to talk about one of our core beliefs which is a practice management software should allow for data portability and data ownership. A practitioner should be able to change software vendors and never feel locked in because she cannot get her data out of the system. So the ability to export your data in an open format is very important to us. Also, we believe the data you've entered into a practice management software is owned by you the practitioner, and not the software vendor.

Below is a screenshot showing the export service within the Jasmine Practice Management software and what you are seeing is the ability by the practitioner to export all her data into a downloadable zip file. And within the zip file contains a CSV (Comma Separated Variable) file with all your data in an nonproprietary and easily portable format.

Data Portability: What are the issues to consider?

• The data needs to be easily exportable. This should be a standard, built in feature. You should not have to pay the software vendor to export your data.
  
• The format of the data from the export should be in a nonproprietary format and is understood by other software.
  
• Make sure your software vendor is clear that you own your data that is within the system.

So as you compare various EMRs and practice management software in the market, always keep in mind whether the system allows for data portability. You own your data.