Known world wide as the developer of BAHA®, advanced hearing–rehabilitation technology, Entific Medical Systems AB maintains a network of regional sales offices to oversee the distribution of its range of products. Canadian operations are based in Toronto, where Entific Canada Inc. ensures that patients and medical professionals have access to the latest developments in this constantly evolving field. And behind the scenes, FileMaker Pro 7 plays an important role in ensuring that the technology remains in prime operating condition.

Business Challenge

Entific Canada Inc. distributes BAHA® advanced hearing rehabilitation systems throughout the country, working through clinical professionals who prescribe and surgically–implant the necessary components. The company stands behind its products through a warranty service program, and a full service and repair center based in Edmonton, Alberta.

Administering the warranty program requires the storage of a great deal of data, including serial numbers and patient and doctor information, and all this information then has to be relayed to the service center before a repair order can be implemented. Several years ago, the company adopted FileMaker Pro, which eliminated much of the manual data management — and now, with FileMaker Pro 7, the information is directly accessible by repair center personnel at any time.

Successful Solution

At the Toronto office, Christine Bukowski makes constant use of the FileMaker Pro database system. As the office manager, it is her responsibility to see that warranty files are always up to date. "When I sell a BAHA unit," she explains, "I enter its serial number into the system. Audiologists then fill out the BAHA warranty registration card with patient information and send the card back to us. When the card arrives, I enter the information into the file, and make sure the file is complete. We offer a two year repair warranty, so if the unit is sent in for repair, I can check to see if it's still under warranty."

Once the warranty check is complete, the focus shifts to the Entific Canada Inc. repair center, nearly 1,700 miles away in Edmonton — and FileMaker Pro 7 allows faster–than–ever access to the necessary repair data on both sides of the network. "FileMaker Pro 7 lets us use a Virtual Private Network to connect directly between the offices," Christine notes. "FileMaker Pro is running all the time on this end, and the repair center can log in whenever necessary to access the service reports they need. Those reports are linked by serial number back to the original warranty information." And even as the repair is underway, FileMaker Pro fills another vital function, tracking the deployment of loaner BAHA units assigned to patients while their own devices are being repaired.

It's a lot easier now, because instead of doing data entry twice — once here at my end and once in Edmonton — now we only have to do it once. That saves a lot of administrative time, and in a two–person office like ours, that's really important.

— Christine Bukowski, Office Manager, Entific Canada Inc.

Now migrated to FileMaker Pro 7 from an original FileMaker Pro 5.5 database system, Entific Canada Inc.'s solution consists of four tables, containing thousands of individual records. Reports may be generated directly from the system, and the database lends itself to easy, efficient modification.

FileMaker Pro developer Ron Nemeth of CoreSolutions Development Inc. handled the migration from FileMaker Pro 5.5 to FileMaker Pro 7. "It was actually the first one we did," he comments, "and there was a bit of trial and error before we decided which approach to take. After that, though, it went very easy — we used FM Robot for part of the conversion, and it was very helpful. All in all, the conversion went very smoothly — and because it was a small system, it was a nice way for us to get our feet wet with FileMaker Pro 7."