1. Flexible Transfer of Data

GSI instruments have remained stand-alone and dedicated for hearing evaluations. Over the past decade or so, going paperless, or putting patient results into an electronic health record, has become essential. GSI Suite offers the ability to manage patient data in a way that meets the needs of electronic data management while still allowing efficient dedicated testing. For example, there are large clinics with multiple sound booths that are networked and as soon as the patient results are obtained, the data may be transferred into GSI Suite. There are other offices where the providers carry laptops or tablets with them through the patient journey. It is seamless for these providers to plug in a USB cable into their laptop and transfer data as they go. Another example is the testing is done and transferred near the equipment and then the provider accesses the results in a different location for reporting and chart notes. In each scenario, the focus is on the patient testing and the management of data seamlessly fits in with each strategy.

2. Template Editor

Reporting is a critical part of hearing health care management. From a single provider office to a multi-specialty clinic, the template editor of GSI Suite offers customization to meet the unique needs of many clinics. GSI Suite includes multiple report templates that can be used instantly with audiometric data; however, it is very common for hearing health care providers to have a method of reporting that is unique. With the Suite template editor, it is possible to build report templates from scratch or modify and change predesigned reports. Another great feature of the template editor is that you can create different reports for different purposes. I was just working with an audiologist who had about five report templates that were used on a regular basis. There was one for a completely comprehensive evaluation, one for just middle ear evaluation, one for otoacoustic emissions only, one for a specific referral source, and one for auditory processing evaluations. Flexibility of the template editor allowed them to create the templates needed up front so when it was time to create a report, it was seamless. There are also many tools built into the editor to assist with spacing, alignment, and other elements that give to report the professional look that one would expect from GSI.

3. Predefined Comments

When I was practicing audiology full time and my patient load was overwhelming, writing reports seemed like the worst task. I don't even remember how long it took me to realize that I was basically reinventing the wheel every time I sat down to do my charts. I was putting the same components and often the same verbiage into each and every report. When I finally realized that there were a lot of repeated phrases in structure, I created word documents that had my common phrases that I could insert to my reports. In GSI Suite, it is possible to generate predefined comments to make reporting efficient and effective. Much like the templates, you can create as many predefined comments as you want that can be inserted into the comment section in GSI Suite. You can also create tables and charts that can be inserted and then modified if you need to report something visually. There are two places that you can create predefined comments: one is for clinical comments and one is for session comments. Clinical comments are what I would consider to be the main report of the patient evaluation and session comments are more specialty comments. I have seen some very creative and clever uses of both clinical and session comments in combination with predefined comments. Having the words that I need to use in my report at my fingertips reduces my stress and increases my efficiency.

4. Noah Compatible

When you load GSI Suite on your computer, the program looks to see if you have Noah installed. If you do, it will embed GSI Suite as a module. When you open Noah and select a patient and then select GSI Suite, the data that you transfer is integrated into the Noah public database engine. What this means is that any other program that searches the public database engine to populate their module will be able to grab audiometric data from GSI’s equipment. This also means that GSI is able to grab data from other equipment modules and use it to populate GSI Suite. When I transfer audiometric data into GSI Suite through Noah, I am able to immediately access thresholds and speech data in the hearing aid modules. Additionally, when I transfer data into GSI Suite through Noah and there is a business management software present, the business management software is able to utilize GSI’s data as well. The direct connection with Noah saves me not only time but reduces the chance for error with manual entry.

5. Merge Sessions

There are many times when I have done testing with one brand of audiometer and a different brand of tympanometer. Before paperless offices and electronic medical records, it was easy to integrate those records results because I was writing them with my hand. Now, it is a little bit more challenging. The reason that this is so challenging is because when you transfer data in from one manufacturer and hit save and then transfer data from a different manufacturer and hit save, the data is stored in separate sessions. When you use GSI Suite in Noah, you have the ability to merge two different sessions that have patient data into one temporary session for reporting. Before GSI Suite, your option was to print out two separate reports and scan them into one or attach separate PDFs to the medical record. Using the merge feature of GSI Suite in Noah enhances the quality and efficiency of my reporting.

Learn more about GSI Suite by visiting the product page, GSI ADVANCE, and getting in touch with your local distributor.