Houston VIP

Houston VIP is a computerised medical patient records software that runs your medical office efficiently and with ease. The electronic medical billing system can expand as your practice grows, or help your existing practice to run more efficiently, thereby meeting and surpassing your needs.

Using the existing ARGUS interface within VIP requires the agent to both;

1. transform an outgoing HL7 referral message generated by VIP to a non-proprietary HL7 message.
2. transform a non-proprietary incoming HL7 referral message into an ARGUS HL7 message.

The ARGUS interface of VIP produces proprietary HL7 messages that other receiving clinical applications may have interoperability issues with, to resolve this incompatibility issue, the agent needs to be configured to re-envelope the message prior to routing it through the ReferralNet network.

The screen shot below displays how the agent needs to be configured to ensure compatibility with the receiving clinical applications. The directory path should match the directory path specified in the Configure Argus Interface section.

* If you are using ReferralNet Agent version 3.3.0 and above, use the Archiving Feature.

In order to get the incoming HL7 correspondence into VIP, the agent needs to apply a transformation prior to saving the message to the nominated incoming folder. This transformation modifies the HL7 enveloping only, not the contents of the encapsulated letter (this is never touched), to satisfy the proprietary requirements of the ARGUS interface.

A preset already exists for this, so simply choose the preset from the drop down and browse to the previously configured incoming folder location specified in the Configure Argus Interface section.

* Don't forget to add and configure the additional action by following the agent backup scheme.
* If you are using ReferralNet Agent version 3.3.0 and above, use the Archiving Feature instead.

Houston VIP supports two explicit HL7 message vendor interfaces, CNS and Argus, with no support for ReferralNet. The ReferralNet agent can however, utilise the existing ARGUS interface to get around this support limitation. If ARGUS is also being used by the site in addition to ReferralNet, then this workaround will not be feasible.

1. Setup –> Practice Preferences –> General Preferences
2. select "Communications Settings"
3. choose "Argus Communication"
   
4. click "Message Types"
   1. ensure "rsd messaging-hl7" is selected
   2. configure the "incoming directory" and "outgoing directory"
      

1. Setup –> Providers –> Other Clinics
2. select Provider and click "Modify" (or create a new provider)
   
3. set "message provider and format" to "argus communication - rsd message - hl7"
4. enter referralnet username in rsd email field.
   

1. Patient –> Letters
2. click "new"
   
3. use an RSD template
   
4. select a provider
   
5. click on "Send via rsd" in letter writer toolbar (rightmost icon)

1. File –> Communications –> Services
2. select "Argus Messaging"
3. click "Proceed"
   
4. This will drop any prepared letters as hl7 into the outgoing directory, and load any hl7 messages from the incoming directory (use file –> inbox –> correspondence to view).
   

• Last tested on VIP 9.08v
• Houston Medical
• Phone: 1800 420 066 or 02 9669 1844