Key takeaways
- The initial build is the smallest part of the cost; maintenance, security and support continue every year.
- Key-person risk is real when one developer understands the system.
- HIPAA responsibility for a custom system sits entirely with your organization.
- Compare full annual costs, including staff time, not just license fees against build costs.
What a custom system takes to run
Building your own safety reporting system is appealing: you get exactly the workflow you want, you own the data and the code, and you're not tied to a vendor. For organizations with strong internal development teams, it can seem like the natural choice.
The initial build is only the beginning. A custom reporting system is a permanent software product that needs maintenance, security updates, new features and support, all from internal resources competing with other IT priorities.
Developer dependency is a common risk. When the person who built the system leaves, much of the knowledge can leave too, especially if documentation is thin. Bringing a new developer up to speed on an internal tool takes time and money.
HIPAA responsibility sits entirely with your organization: access controls, audit logging, encryption, BAAs with any cloud services the system uses, security testing and vulnerability management.
Requirements keep moving. When reporting rules change or a workflow change would make reporting easier, the update has to be planned, built and deployed internally, and prioritized against everything else IT is working on.
When you compare options, put the full cost on the table for each: developer and analyst time, hosting, security and compliance work, support, and the cost of key-person risk.
Questions to ask in any evaluation
Put the same questions to every option, including us, and get the answers in writing.
- Who maintains the system today, and what happens if they leave?
- When was the last security review, and who owns the fixes?
- What changes are waiting in the IT queue, and for how long?
- What would it cost each year to run, support and secure, including staff time?
ImprovementFlow
Safety Reporting
Safety Reporting is configured for your event categories and review structure rather than built from scratch, with HIPAA compliance, a BAA and SSO included in every package.
How ImprovementFlow compares
ImprovementFlow is configured for your event categories and review structure rather than built from scratch. Staff report from any device or a QR code on the unit, each report is routed by event type, department and severity, and every event carries an owner and a status.
Updates reach every customer without internal development work, and your team changes event types, forms, categories and routing itself, with no IT queue. Every safety event keeps an audit trail. We sign a BAA, and HIPAA compliance and SSO are included in every package; your team still decides who has access and how the tool is used.
Implementation support and training are included, and if a pilot doesn't continue you receive a complete export of your data in CSV or JSON.
Bringing your records across
Moving from a custom system? Bring a database, CSV or JSON export and your category list. We'll map your categories with you and import your past records, so your history comes with you.
What ImprovementFlow includes
- No internal codebase to maintain or secure
- Configured for your categories and review structure
- Event types, forms, categories and routing your team changes itself, without IT
- Routing by event type, department and severity to the team that reviews it
- An owner, status, severity and tags on every event, with feedback to named reporters
- Implementation support and training included
- HIPAA compliance, a BAA and SSO included in every package
Frequently asked questions
- How is ImprovementFlow priced?
- Pricing is by program bundle, not per user, and HIPAA compliance, a BAA and SAML/SSO are included in every package. We don't publish prices on comparison pages. See the /pilot page for details.
- How does moving from a custom-built system work?
- We start from the event categories, severity levels and review structure you already use, and set up categories and routing rules with you. Implementation support and training are included in every package. In a 90-day pilot, setup takes the first two weeks and staff start reporting on real data in week 3. We import your past records from your current system, spreadsheets or paper archives, so your trend history comes with you. After setup, your team changes event types, forms, categories and routing itself, without IT.
- Can we pilot ImprovementFlow before fully switching from a custom-built system?
- Yes. The 90-day pilot runs ImprovementFlow on a single program at a defined scope, with success criteria agreed at kickoff. See the /pilot page for details.