Replacing the equipment and services behind your hearing testing program can feel intimidating. Whether you are a safety manager running a hearing conservation program, a service provider delivering audiometric testing for employer clients, a researcher monitoring for ototoxicity, or a healthcare or hearing services provider screening patients, you need the switch to your new system to be smooth and turnkey.
Understandably, you are likely worried about your data — your audiograms, baselines, and patient or employee records. You may also wonder whether your program will develop gaps during the transition, and how much of your team’s time the switch will take.
Those concerns are valid. The switch is manageable when you sequence it correctly. Follow the steps in this guide and work with a partner that takes the hardest parts off your plate to keep your data and records intact throughout the switch.
The switch in five steps
Making the switch without losing data or creating gaps in your program comes down to five steps:
- Export your data before you lose access to your current system.
- Import your history into the new system.
- Set up your new Data Management Portal.
- Keep your audiogram review coverage in place, if applicable.
- Train your team and go live.
Following these steps will help ensure a manageable data migration and keep your program running without interruption.
Step 1: Export your data before you lose access
Your records, such as audiograms, baselines, patient or employee records, and threshold-shift history, are what your program runs on. Export them while you still have access to your current system. Once that access ends, recovering your data will be difficult or impossible.
At minimum, export:
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- Every patient or employee’s audiogram records and results
- Baseline audiograms, if your program uses them
- Date of each audiogram and the name of the examiner
- Your patient or employee roster and test schedule
- Any shift determinations already on record, if applicable
- Employee name and job classification
- The employee or patient’s most recent noise exposure assessment, if your program uses them
Step 2: Import your history into the new system
This is the step that protects your program, because your data history is what everything else depends on. If you need to detect hearing shifts and a baseline does not move across to your new system, you lose the reference point you need to catch shifts accurately. For patient care, that same audiogram history is each patient’s record over time, so losing it creates gaps in their care. If you’re performing OSHA-mandated testing, records must be retained for the duration of each employee’s employment, so a gap during migration becomes a gap in compliance.
Choose a solution that can accept your full data history, or better yet, a partner that will handle the import for you. The SHOEBOX Data Management Portal lets you import data from your legacy audiometric system. If you would rather not manage the transfer yourself, SHOEBOX’s Professional Services team can import your historical data for you.
Once your historical audiogram data is imported, your test history is intact, and you can resume audiometric testing exactly where you left off.
Before you rely on the imported data, spot-check a sample of your historical audiogram records against your source export and confirm they match. A mis-mapped record jeopardizes your ability to track changes in hearing or threshold shifts over time.
Step 3: Set up your Data Management Portal
With your history imported, the next step is to set up the portal your program runs on. This is where you organize your records, set your team’s access levels, and configure the reports you rely on. The SHOEBOX Data Management Portal keeps your audiograms and results in one secure, HIPAA-compliant place. Here, your team can find records, track changes or shifts in hearing over time, and pull reports without digging through devices and spreadsheets.
The Data Management Portal is ready to use out of the box, but it is highly configurable to fit how your program runs. If you prefer, the SHOEBOX team can set it up for you to match how your program is organized.
Step 4: Keep your audiogram review coverage in place, if applicable
If you’re a hearing care provider, you can interpret audiograms on your own. If you manage OSHA-mandated testing programs or oversee pharmaceutical research, you likely rely on audiogram review services. A switch can interrupt the professional review your program depends on. So, before you move, confirm your new partner provides that oversight.
SHOEBOX Audiological Services gives you access to a network of licensed audiologists for timely threshold shift determination and confirmation, audiogram review, and baseline revisions directly through your Data Management Portal.
Step 5: Train your team and go live
With your history in place and your review coverage confirmed, train your test administrators on the new workflow and go live. Now your next round of testing will stay on schedule, with no gaps. SHOEBOX Customer Success handles onboarding and team training, so you go live without disrupting your testing.
We’re here to help make the switch easy
If you are moving to a new audiometric testing solution, a short meeting with the SHOEBOX team will map out exactly what your switch would look like. Whether you want to manage the migration yourself or have SHOEBOX’s Professional Services team handle it for you (importing your historical data, configuring your Data Management Portal, and managing your device fleet), we will tailor the plan to your program.
SHOEBOX provides everything you need for a successful, long-term hearing testing program: the audiometer, data management, data migration, onboarding and training, professional audiology review, ongoing device management and calibration, and more. Contact us today to plan your switch and keep your program running without interruption.
