Smart Scheduling

Entrepreneurship is the modern day saga for many engineers and students who want to pave their own path to success than working under an employer. When you think of an entrepreneur, you think of his mentality, how he put thought into the startup idea, how he modeled innovation into a company and how he affected the lives of many. When you think of a startup, you think of investments, profits, future plan and scalability. But how many of you have actually thought of startups that engineer a noble cause? I am not talking about NGOs or nonprofit companies, rather companies that sow the seeds of sheer excellence in quality care for the society. One such start up I am going to talk about is Smart Scheduling.

Most of you must be wondering if it is not a nonprofit, if it is not an NGO, how it is benefitting the society. It is often said that the youth is the future builder of the society. The power of the brain can sometimes conquer monetary provisions and thus prove to be beneficial. Smart Scheduling is the brain child of one such youth and an intelligent one. This MIT graduate, Christopher Moses is not only the CEO of Smart Scheduling today but also the very founder of this startup.

Many inventions begin at MIT since it is the hub of innovative thinking combined with excellence. So how did Chris begin his journey with Smart Scheduling? Smart Scheduling uses data science to mine patient scheduling histories and hence predict who is more likely to cancel or miss an appointment. It thus acts as a technical appointment book that can be maintained at a clinic or a hospital to calculate the waiting time of patients and thus deliver treatment with efficiency. Chris Moses along with Gabriel Belfort attended a healthcare hackathon wherein they proposed the idea of scheduling patient history through data science algorithms. This hackathon acted as their incubator. Healthbox and now AthenaHealth have invested in Smart Scheduling and have helped accelerate its growth.

Smart Scheduling launched in 2012 and they already have pilots in several countries and are backed up by two healthcare firms, Martin’s Point Health Care and Steward’s Health Care system. The main reason behind its growth is the extent of its usability. Front desk professionals in healthcare are not as efficient as an algorithm and this is a known fact. Moreover doctors prefer having a time bound schedule than having to wait or reschedule with multiple patients on a regular basis. Older people or new patients who do miss/cancel appointments do not have to worry about forgetting an appointment since their predictions are already scheduled. The public in general is liable to better response from the doctor. In turn the health information system helps in providing quality and timely care and generates efficient results. Another important factor is the easy to use software’s API. Any healthcare professional can learn how to access its functionality that helps reduce the time spent in device training.

Startups like Smart Scheduling are difficult to coexist in this ever growing market. It is important for them to procure sufficient funding at the right time. Targeting firms with the want to grow themselves by investing in healthcare is the main idea behind Smart Scheduling’s revenue generation plan. There are many such startups that are gaining momentum which people are not aware of. These start-up services are not for mere use but for inspiration to transform a noble idea into a public utility.

 

Damini Naidu

technology enthusiast, trained bharatnatyam dancer, past-time philosophical writer, movie buff

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