ClinicServer, a Saint John-based company that helps health clinics digitize their operations and records, has expanded into Zimbabwe as it moves from allied health facilities into more mainstream patient care.

The company began in its current form in 2010 with $1 million in angel funding and aims to help health clinics use cloud-based software for scheduling, billing, maintaining patient records and other common tasks.  The company says its basic service can produce a 5 percent increase in each professional’s revenues by allowing him or her to see more patients, and the premium service produces an 18 percent revenue increase.

“We really have pushed the envelope in terms of understanding what the market wants,” said Chief Executive Chris Boudreau in an interview. “What we really want to do is to democratize healthcare. We want to take the data and bring it back to who it really matters to – and that’s the patient.”

The origins of the company date back to 1999 when Paul Kasdan, now the Chief Strategic Officer, began to develop software that would streamline the processes in his orthotics clinic. Boudreau joined 11 years later, and they began to spin out their product to the so-called allied healthcare field – that is, clinics that meet patients’ needs outside mainstream health providers. 

“In Canada, getting into mainstream medical is like walking up to your waist in molasses in December uphill,” said Boudreau. The company decided to avoid the bureaucratic complexities of the public health sector and target the physiotherapy, chiropractic, massage and naturopathic clinics that have grown rapidly in the country.

The business has spread in Canada and the U.S., and earlier this year Boudreau received an enquiry from Communication 247, a private healthcare provider in Zimbabwe. That resulted in the two companies signing a memorandum of understanding for ClinicServer to provide clinic-management solutions to the Zimbabwean private health provider.

Boudreau said his company felt comfortable doing the deal because they were dealing with private providers rather than the Zimbabwe government, and because the servers and all IP would remain in Canada.

Aside from expanding to a new continent, the deal is attractive because it offers a chance for ClinicServer to work with a mainstream provider – which is a strong long-term goal for the company. It is committed to digitizing medical records so patients can have free and easy access to them, thereby improving their healthcare.

Boudreau said there is negligible incentive for change by Canadian public healthcare providers, but the U.S. has offered doctors $40,000 each  to digitize their operations with a deadline of 2015. He believes the company will reach mainstream providers in the U.S. before Canada.  

The Canadian market that does excite Boudreau is the multi-disciplinary clinics, which offer a range of medical practices under one roof and are growing strongly across the country.

ClinicServer is planning to be profitable by the end of 2013, and in order to meet that goal it hopes to raise about $1.3 million in equity funding to improve its  sales and marketing.