FysioHolland’s growth spurt: “As you grow, small frustrations with software and processes grow too. That’s when you start automating.”

Finance director Geert Brouwer and project manager Alwin de Wit are leading an automation initiative at FysioHolland.

Growth brings opportunities, but an organisation has to keep pace. Over the preceding years, FysioHolland had become the largest centralised provider in the physiotherapy sector. Acquisitions and new locations were driving expansion, which also brought challenges. “FysioHolland is the physiotherapy organisation in the Netherlands. Being large has certain disadvantages, and we hope to avoid those,” Brouwer explains.

“We have grown through a number of acquisitions. The advantage is that you grow quickly. The disadvantage is that you keep adding new processes, software and organisations. Two years ago, we decided to pause and standardise our IT landscape before growing further. As you grow, there is a real risk of accepting more and more exceptions in a process. A few cases are fine, but forty or fifty become frustrating. You reach a point where you can no longer handle everything properly: every month you forget an exception. That is what we have been working on over the past few years.”

With 130 locations across the Netherlands, FysioHolland faced challenges particular to a national physiotherapy provider. Smaller providers can manage with one database in Intramed, the widely used practice software. FysioHolland needed twenty. “When you are small, you might find it frustrating. When you are large, it becomes very frustrating, and then you start automating,” says Brouwer.

“We also automate certain tasks because doing them by hand is simply frustrating.”

Why FysioHolland started automating

Processes needed to become more consistent and efficient. Previously, regional teams had been responsible for this work. Internally, there was a clear need for a uniform approach to reduce the administrative burden. Frustration with time-consuming tasks played a role, alongside concern for employees. “We started automating to carry out time-intensive tasks faster and more efficiently. That allows us to shift our focus to other activities. We also automate certain tasks because doing them by hand is simply frustrating.”

Administrative pressure in healthcare

Healthcare carries a heavy administrative burden. Although physiotherapy faces this to a lesser extent, De Wit says software robots save considerable time by taking over administrative tasks. “Mr. Data,” as one robot is called, “extracts data from our electronic patient record and transfers it to the dashboard. Previously, we had to do this ourselves across more than twenty administrations, because Intramed offers no other way. Our digital workplace team, the IT department, spent a lot of time on it.” The estimated saving is around eight hours per week. “Alongside reducing manual work, we increased the frequency from three times a week to every day.”

Healthcare providers handle large amounts of data. They need to communicate with insurers that reimburse the costs of care, which requires detailed patient information. Missing information leads to returned claims and additional work. “Checking that a person is who they say they are is a very important part of the claims process,” De Wit explains.

“The robot will already do much of the preparation over the weekend.”

Brouwer continues: “Submitting a claim involves around fifteen steps. Why is it so complicated? We submit claims to the health insurer, and if every box on their checklist is not ticked, the claim comes straight back. We are developing a larger robot to check that all those boxes are ticked.” He expects this robot to take a substantial amount of work off the organisation’s hands. The claims process usually starts on Monday and finishes on Wednesday. “The robot will do a lot of the preparation over the weekend. Hopefully, that means we can approach the insurers on Monday or Tuesday morning.”

What Yarado delivers for FysioHolland

The robots take over many manual tasks. Brouwer also quantifies the benefits. “The data export should save around eight hours per week,” he estimates. “We also have robots that are deployed occasionally to clear backlogs. That saves a great deal. Closing patient files would have taken us around 0.6 FTE, more than a thousand hours, this year. We decided to add a second robot because the work was not progressing quickly enough. That is another advantage of a robot.” Deploying an additional robot requires no recruiter.

He estimates that the robot checking Dutch citizen service numbers (BSNs) before forms are sent to insurers saves another eight hours per week. FysioHolland is also developing a larger robot that Brouwer expects to free up ten hours per week. The benefit for employees is clear: “Of course, we are keeping those two FTEs. We have many claims specialists who have been senior for years, yet still do a lot of junior work because the process requires it. Using the robot takes out that junior work, leaving the senior work: investigating cases. This brings a major improvement in quality, and we will probably have less need to replace an employee when they leave.”

Why FysioHolland chose Yarado

Yarado’s monthly pricing model and low implementation costs appealed to Brouwer when he was looking for an automation partner. Having worked with RPA before, he immediately saw how the model could fit his organisation. “What I learned about RPA is that if you do not write down exactly which processes you want automated, you can end up with an enormous bill. Everyone needs to be focused on an exact process description and handling every file according to the instructions,” he says of his earlier experience. He says this was never an issue with Yarado.

“The pricing model was also a deciding factor for me. With subscription models, you sometimes feel the service stops once you have paid. Yarado really surprised us there. Your team made a real effort to configure the robot perfectly,” he concludes. With several robots already running, FysioHolland regularly discusses where another could help. Improvement continues beyond the fourth robot. One favourite agenda item is choosing their names. Mr. Data, The Terminator and Vlugge JAapie, a robot that makes sure the boxes are marked ‘yes’, are already at work.

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