New! Sycle NOAH 4 Synchronizer
Carolyn Smaka: Welcome, Brian! What is your role at Sycle, and what did you do before joining the Sycle team?
Brian Jones: I’ve been at Sycle almost eight years. I started out as the manager of the Help Desk and I took on other responsibilities as we changed that role into more of a troubleshooting, design and development position. I recently was promoted to product manager of the Sycle NOAH 4 Synchronizer project after working on it for about eight months. Before Sycle, I worked with AT&T in server management and IT management.
Carolyn: Tell me about the new Sycle NOAH 4 Synchronizer (SNS).
Brian: As you know, NOAH is a database for integrating audiograms and other client-related tasks with a piece of hardware directly connected to your computer. You can test a person’s hearing and the audiogram automatically gets saved in the patient file. Sycle allows us to integrate all those systems into one so that you can keep up with demographics, track data and make sales. You can also keep hearing aid information tied directly to the patient record. There is no more need for double entry or to have a dedicated system to run that product. It now integrates platforms so that anyone who is using Sycle with the SNS software can see the NOAH data immediately from anywhere.
We were HIMSA certified with Sycle NOAH Sync 2, and it evolved through the NOAH 3.7 system versions. The NOAH 4 Sync is the product that is HIMSA certified for NOAH 4. It is a much smoother implementation than the previous versions. From a technical perspective, there is a smaller application footprint on the workstation and on the network in the office. Historically, the NOAH 3 module would run using a high number of system resources. Now, because of the way that the NOAH 4 engine is built, those system resources are allocated to other things like memory and speed. The efficiency is better, your machine works more smoothly, the operating system is cleaner, and the tool itself is cleaner.
Carolyn: Can you give a few examples of the differences between this version and previous version of Noah Synchronizer?
Brian: One of the key tools that this version has that the previous versions did not is the ability to work in Windows 8, which is the newest operating system from Microsoft. The HIMSA NOAH 3 implementation that we were utilizing in SNS 2 does not allow for installation on Windows 8. They do certify the NOAH 4 application on Windows 8, which means that you can install SNS on a new computer. The other great thing is that it still works on Windows XP Pro, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1, 32 bit and 64 bit. Any Windows operating system after XP Pro should have the capabilities to use it.
Carolyn: Can you give me some case examples for the NOAH 4 Synchronizer? How does it work when I am running a practice and interfacing with it every day?
Brian: You would run your practice the same way you always have using Sycle.net. When a patient sits down to have a hearing test, you click a button in Sycle that launches a module very similar to the NOAH software you already know. The NOAH module pops up with all the patient’s demographics. You could then perform a test or use any of the other modules within NOAH. If you are performing a test and immediately want to do a fitting and fine tuning, you can do that as you always have, but when you are done, you click “close” and it saves that data back to Sycle. Sycle then keeps that data in the patient’s record so that the person in the front office can pull up the test or appointment notes and say, “I see you had a fine-tuning done, so we are going to schedule an appointment in another three weeks.” This gives everyone in the office the ability to see all of that data in one place, at one time, without having to do double-entry.
Carolyn: If you have multiple offices and the patient is going to a different office for whatever reason, all the data is available through Sycle, correct?
Brian: Right. Another benefit is for people who may do offsite work. They may go to a nursing home or a local meeting and want to be able to do hearing tests while they are there. With the portability of most audiometers and the portability of this software, they can get into their Sycle server and pull up the patient’s NOAH record, as long as there is a Wi-Fi connection. They can basically create a mobile booth and do tests wherever they are.
Carolyn: Does this work with a Mac?
Brian: HIMSA does not currently support installation of NOAH on a Mac. You can run a virtual machine on a Mac, which acts as if it were a Windows device; as long as it is one of the approved operating systems, it should work.
That Beta has been running now for several months on several hundred workstations. We have had an extensive Beta pilot where we have received feedback from our customers to improve the software. There has been some extensive back-and-forth communication with our customer base, letting them drive us on what we need to fix and what is most important.
Carolyn: I know that Sycle is continuously developing and enhancing your product based on your customer input. How do you manage customer feedback?
Brian: We have a fantastic customer experience team that handles that interface directly with the customer and the product owners, managers, and the development team all in one. We do have a consistent flow of development and testing going on all the time. We get requests for changes every day, and those changes get qualified and quantified and put in place as quickly as we can.
This pilot has been in the works now for three or four months solid, and there was a year of development before that with the Sycle NOAH 4 system. It’s been a long time coming and we’re excited it’s now available.
Carolyn: What happens if users have been running NOAH for years and want to install this? Does it import your data into this tool?
Brian: Yes. We do a migration from a user’s current data system to our data system; we have to convert all their records and then do a match between systems. For example, if you have a Bob Smith in your NOAH data and a Bob Smith in your Sycle data, we try to go in there and see if those two people are the same. We use their demographics, date of birth, appointment data, et cetera to see if we can figure who they are.
Carolyn: Okay. I see that HIMSA is going to be moving everyone over to NOAH 4 soon. Is there any way to estimate how many people have moved over and how many people still are running NOAH 3?
Brian: I do not really know. We have several hundred users that are installed in the SNS 2.0 version, and probably about 50 to 75 percent of those are installed using the Beta 4 version. We are hoping to convert all of those to NOAH 4 as quickly as possible. The installation package that we have designed is such that anyone who has ever installed anything on a Windows machine can do it quickly and easily.
Carolyn: Where can people go if they want to upgrade or install the Sycle Noah 4 Synchronizer?
Brian: They can either call us at 888-881-7925, or send an e-mail to support@sycle.net. If anyone is interested in signing up with Sycle as their practice management service, they can also visit Sycle.net to get started.
Carolyn: Thanks Brian, I appreciate you getting me up to speed on this new tool.
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