Are application integrations really beneficial?
Feb, 2020 · 3 min read
Many practice management solutions tout the number of integrations that they support. Should this always be considered beneficial? Let us take a look at the dark side of integrations.
Integrations enable functionality not present in the system to be incorporated. This can be very useful for functionality that should not be built into the practice management system. A good example is payments. A practice management company is not in the payments business and payment processing requires specialized security protocols to be followed.
Integrations enable functionality not present in the system to be incorporated. This can be very useful for functionality that should not be built into the practice management system. A good example is payments. A practice management company is not in the payments business and payment processing requires specialized security protocols to be followed.
If the functionality is something that should be considered part of the practice management solution than this integration has a number of impacts that should be considered:
- There will be an increase in overall system complexity
- Troubleshooting problems will be more difficult when trying to determine fault
- Overall system costs will be higher
- There will be an increased security / privacy exposure
- The user experience may not be consistent across the functionality
When evaluating practice management and integration opportunities ask yourself these questions.
- Does the added functionality or other benefits truly outweigh the negative impacts?
- Is this a stop-gap integration and if so, would decommissioning it be difficult?
- Will the practice management vendor phase out the integration if they provide the function in a future release?
