Integration testing underway
CareConnect's Integration Testing Team conducts end-to-end testing of workflows
Full patient scenarios – such as following a patient from the time they are scheduled for an appointment to the time they are billed for their visit – will be tested in CareConnect.
CareConnect’s Integration Testing Team began end-to-end testing of workflows designed for the UCLA Health System at the Michigan Operations Center in Santa Monica on Jan. 9.
Integration testing involves several processes: module-to-module testing to make sure applications within CareConnect – such as ADT (admission, discharge, and transfer) and scheduling – are communicating properly with each other; ensuring CareConnect communicates properly with existing third-party systems at UCLA such as Essentris and CView; month-end cycle testing, to ensure bills are generated; and testing to make sure equipment we use at UCLA -- such as barcode scanners, armband printers and two-tray laser printers – communicate properly with CareConnect.
Over the next two months, more than 80 scenarios associated with Go-Live 1 will be tested in integration testing. The scenarios involve multiple CareConnect applications such as ADT, ambulatory, scheduling, and managed care. Sample integration testing scripts include: unit-to-unit transfer, emergency department to intensive care unit, admission, and canceled appointment.
A full scenario – such as one that involves one or multiple overnight stays -- can take up to three days to test completely. For example, a patient is admitted to the emergency department, transferred to the operating room for surgery and to an inpatient unit for several days for recovery. They are discharged and then receive their bill.
“Integration testing is very important because it involves typical scenarios in the hospital,” said Faisal Siddiqui, the CareConnect integration test lead. “We are making sure all the systems are connected with each other properly and that applications within CareConnect are functioning as they should. The better integration testing goes, the fewer issues we will have at go-live.”
Testing of individual department processes in CareConnect began in October as part of application testing. Integration testing ensures that those individual workflows which might include scheduling a patient or issuing a refund, work seamlessly together.
At the same time, an interface team was working to develop and test the software needed to allow existing systems to communicate with CareConnect. CareConnect will replace an estimated 65 of the legacy systems being used currently throughout the health system.
Several interfaces are currently being used in the integration testing process including the ones that have been developed for Amcom, our hospital paging system; SafeTrace, a blood donor management information system; Centricity Perioperative Manager (CPM), an operating room management system; and Essentris Critical Care, which we currently use for clinical documentation at our hospitals.
As patient scenarios are tested by the integration testing team, they will either pass or be flagged for defects – which are prioritized based on their severity. Defects marked as “critical” are show-stoppers that will need to be fixed within 24 hours; items marked as “high” mean a major functionality is missing, but it is not halting testing of the entire scenario; and items marked as “medium” or “low” will be fixed before Go-Live 2 or for optimization.
The teams are also doing what’s called “negative testing” to make sure that if users try to perform a certain function outside of their scope of practice, CareConnect will not allow the user to perform that function.
Integration testing for Go-Live 1 applications will be conducted in four cycles through March 23. Testing cycles for Go-Live 2 will begin after the first round for Go-Live 1 is complete.
Click here to read more about application testing.
Have questions? Click here to Contact Us or send us an email at CareConnect@mednet.ucla.edu.
See additional photos from Integration Testing below:
