Since COVID reared its ugly head, the facility compliance industry has been slowly changing direction toward using tech for compliance. Last fall, The Joint Commission even commented on how they would start taking digital documentation at surveys. With the clinical side being pushed to telehealth in 2020, the move to electronic documentation has been inevitable. So, you may be already asking, “What is ICM and what does it do?” It stands for Integrated Compliance Management. Simply put, ICM is an operations platform designed specifically for regulatory facility compliance.

Integrated Compliance Management (or ICM) is for any organization, large or small, needing to manage multiple facets of regulatory compliance under one umbrella. What a CRM is for the sales industry and companies like Salesforce, an ICM is to the facility compliance industry and companies like Soleran.

ICMs are usually made up of multiple solutions designed to work seamlessly within one platform. All the components of the platform “talk” to each other or integrate. There are generally two types of ICMs. One type I have seen is where separate company’s programs are piece-mealed and all connected through API connections to become one integrated platform.  In this scenario, the only downfalls could be that you end up referring to separate sites or in some cases separate computers. It could also lead to expensive API connections and more time to implement, based on how many different vendors are involved.

The other type of ICM has one company with multiple compliance programs already integrated together that work as one all-inclusive platform. In this scenario, you are only dealing with one vendor that does the entire ICM. This situation usually means less time and cost to implement, plus only one vendor to work with for technical questions. Both types of ICMs are effective at helping your facility stay organized in the day to day details. It is all about time, cost, and what your facility needs.

In my days as a facility director, I used many different programs to help me with facility compliance. However, most of mine were Word or Excel-based. I did have one small one-off program that was just a step above, but would be considered archaic by today's standards. It would have been so much easier to manage just one program for everything.

What’s exciting about the use of ICMs in the facility compliance field is the efficiency they can bring. They have shared data in real-time. This information creates actionable dashboards, instant reports, and processes for seamless collaboration. An ICM ensures all outstanding processes are completed automatically, closing the loop, while providing flexibility to adapt to future needs. A comprehensive ICM platform makes accountability and efficiency finally achievable!

An ICM also causes you to be proactive, not reactive. As a former surveyor, that is a huge plus! Ideally, an Integrated Compliance Management system should cover each area of the environment for ultimate efficiency.

Soleran is the industry leader in ICM. We offer one platform that manages multiple compliance areas for your entire environment. For example, Soleran offers an all-inclusive Permit Manager Suite that has compliance and scheduling integrated into it.  Now let’s say you need an above the ceiling permit program, a pre-construction risk assessment program, and a hot work permit program as well. Soleran offers all of this in the Permit Manager Suite that is part of Soleran’s ICM for healthcare. Think about how many areas of compliance are touched!  You are meeting NFPA, OSHA, Joint Commission and ASNI standards all in one, since they all integrate and help automate the process for you based upon the PM assigned.

No longer do you have to do a PM, then fill out 3 separate sheets of paper, or a combination of both computer and paper. ICM does it for you by automating the process. All areas are covered based upon a combination of prompting questions within the program, coupled with automated quick checks to help minimize the time to meet the compliance.

Looking at it from a financial aspect, how much cost savings could you have with just one full-time person over a year’s period or even over a 3-year period? Now multiply that by the amount of staff you have and it becomes very clear that there is a return on investment (ROI) not only in the compliance aspect, but in the financial one as well.

I encourage you to contact us and see what we can do to help you with your compliance management. We will walk you through a quick video tour of our ICM and its six suites. We would love to see what we can do to help decrease some of your daily worries and help with your facility compliance.

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