Astera Case Studies A Government Healthcare Department Cuts Down Invoice Data Extraction Time from Hours to Less than a Minute

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	A Government Healthcare Department Cuts Down Invoice Data Extraction Time from Hours to Less than a Minute Astera

A Government Healthcare Department Cuts Down Invoice Data Extraction Time from Hours to Less than a Minute

Astera

Technology Category	Platform as a Service (PaaS) - Data Management Platforms
Applicable Industries	Healthcare & Hospitals
Applicable Functions	Procurement Quality Assurance
Use Cases	Fraud Detection Inventory Management Predictive Replenishment
Services	Data Science Services
Challenge	The government department had to manually extract and aggregate data from more than 1,000 transactions every day. This prevented the team from having an in-depth view of the medication wholesaler’s purchasing patterns and performing accurate cost analysis to utilize the monthly budget better. Similarly, PBMs sent monthly invoices comprising of prescription and billing information in a spreadsheet. However, these invoices had the same compatibility issue and couldn’t be called in the SQL Server database, making it challenging to aggregate usage data for drugs. Read More
About Customer	This government department works with 1,255 medical institutions to provide healthcare facilities to 9 million military veterans every year. It contracts medication wholesalers and PBMs to meet veterans' medication needs and uses Astera ReportMiner to process invoice data from PDFs for reporting and analyses. The department has the largest integrated healthcare network in the United States, contracting 1,255 medical institutions to serve 9 million military veterans every year. It has dedicated Veteran Integrated Service Networks (VISNs) that work with selected hospitals and outpatient clinics to meet veterans’ medical needs in the covered states. VISNs employ medication wholesalers and PBMs on a contractual basis to supply pharmaceutical products to the designated healthcare institutions and bill the government healthcare department. Read More
Solution	The VISN sought a solution that can parse the incoming invoices, whether in PDFs or spreadsheets, and convert them into a format that SSIS can read and query. In addition, the solution must be able to build a repeatable process so that the business users don’t have to extract data from the invoices every time manually. After reviewing multiple products in the market and trying Altair Monarch, the team chose Astera ReportMiner to build extraction templates for the job. Astera ReportMiner enables users to build report models and extraction templates that can automatically process countless invoices, as long as the layout remains the same. The product helps extract data based on the predefined extraction logic. Read More Log in to view content
Contents

Technology Category

Platform as a Service (PaaS) - Data Management Platforms

Applicable Industries

Healthcare & Hospitals

Applicable Functions

Procurement

Quality Assurance

Use Cases

Fraud Detection

Inventory Management

Predictive Replenishment

Services

Data Science Services

Challenge

The government department had to manually extract and aggregate data from more than 1,000 transactions every day. This prevented the team from having an in-depth view of the medication wholesaler’s purchasing patterns and performing accurate cost analysis to utilize the monthly budget better. Similarly, PBMs sent monthly invoices comprising of prescription and billing information in a spreadsheet. However, these invoices had the same compatibility issue and couldn’t be called in the SQL Server database, making it challenging to aggregate usage data for drugs.

About Customer

This government department works with 1,255 medical institutions to provide healthcare facilities to 9 million military veterans every year. It contracts medication wholesalers and PBMs to meet veterans' medication needs and uses Astera ReportMiner to process invoice data from PDFs for reporting and analyses. The department has the largest integrated healthcare network in the United States, contracting 1,255 medical institutions to serve 9 million military veterans every year. It has dedicated Veteran Integrated Service Networks (VISNs) that work with selected hospitals and outpatient clinics to meet veterans’ medical needs in the covered states. VISNs employ medication wholesalers and PBMs on a contractual basis to supply pharmaceutical products to the designated healthcare institutions and bill the government healthcare department.

Solution

The VISN sought a solution that can parse the incoming invoices, whether in PDFs or spreadsheets, and convert them into a format that SSIS can read and query. In addition, the solution must be able to build a repeatable process so that the business users don’t have to extract data from the invoices every time manually. After reviewing multiple products in the market and trying Altair Monarch, the team chose Astera ReportMiner to build extraction templates for the job. Astera ReportMiner enables users to build report models and extraction templates that can automatically process countless invoices, as long as the layout remains the same. The product helps extract data based on the predefined extraction logic.

Impact #1	Processing PDF invoices now takes less than a minute to convert the data into Excel format for importing in the SQL Server database.
Impact #2	With high-quality invoice data available, the VISN’s pharmacoeconomists now get deeper insights into the medication requirements and utilization trends at a granular level.
Impact #3	They can better react to changing market dimensions, like medicine prices, availability of higher quality brands, and better deals on bulk purchases, providing more opportunities for higher cost savings.

Impact #1

Processing PDF invoices now takes less than a minute to convert the data into Excel format for importing in the SQL Server database.

Impact #2

With high-quality invoice data available, the VISN’s pharmacoeconomists now get deeper insights into the medication requirements and utilization trends at a granular level.

Impact #3

They can better react to changing market dimensions, like medicine prices, availability of higher quality brands, and better deals on bulk purchases, providing more opportunities for higher cost savings.

Benefit #1	Processing PDF invoices now takes less than a minute, down from hours.

Benefit #1

Processing PDF invoices now takes less than a minute, down from hours.

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Overview

A Government Healthcare Department Cuts Down Invoice Data Extraction Time from Hours to Less than a Minute

Operational Impact

Quantitative Benefit