RPMS Applications Overview

The Resource and Patient Management System (RPMS) is a decentralized automated information system of over 50 integrated software applications. Many RPMS applications can function in a standalone environment if necessary or appropriate. The system is designed to operate on micro- and mini-computers located in IHS or tribal healthcare facilities.

RPMS software modules fall into three major categories: (1) administrative applications that perform patient registration, scheduling, billing, and linkage functions; (2) clinical applications that support various healthcare programs within IHS; and (3) infrastructure applications.

The Office of Information Technology (OIT) distributes the RPMS application suite to Headquarters and each IHS Area Office. The Area Office then releases the RPMS application suite to the healthcare facilities within its Area. Different facilities use different configurations of RPMS applications, depending upon the types of services they provide. That is, the type of services (e.g., dental, laboratory, and inpatient) offered at a site determines the scope of RPMS applications used by the facility. For instance, because they handle inpatient and outpatient care, hospitals typically run more RPMS applications than other healthcare facilities such as clinics which provide only outpatient care.

RPMS Applications Features

Administrative Applications: The RPMS administrative applications support the business of healthcare provision. Applications in this category are used to collect, store, and report patient demographic information; manage the scheduling, admission, discharge, and transfer of patients in inpatient facilities; create claims and handle both manual and electronic billing and accounts receivables; and electronically manage resource requests and supplies.

Clinical Applications: The RPMS clinical applications directly support the provision of healthcare. Applications in this category generally collect all patient related information gathered during patient contacts into one comprehensive, centralized data file to support healthcare planning, delivery, management, and research. The Patient Care Component provides for entry of visit data which forms the core dataset used by most of the RPMS applications. Other applications in this category support patient care and include, for instance, Laboratory, Radiology, Inpatient and Outpatient Pharmacy, Allergy Tracking, Immunology, Dental, Womens Health.

Infrastructure: This category of applications comprises and supports the RPMS environment with management, development, and communication tools. The MailMan application is an electronic messaging system. VA Kernel software provides a portability layer between the underlying operating system and application code and provides a Kernel Toolkit which supplements the Kernel software package with development and quality assessment tools, capacity management tools, and system management utilities. The VA FileMan is the RPMS database management system (DBMS).

To view a complete list of all the RPMS applications click here