[REWROTE by AI - Original in summary]
Hi,
Apologies for the delay in initiating this discussion.
I wanted to start a focused thread on some critical aspects of Bahmni’s growth and how we can take it forward in a more structured and scalable way. The core idea is to bring together doctors, hospital administrators, implementers, and developers, and create an ecosystem where:
- Core developers continue strengthening Bahmni (upgrades, OpenMRS alignment, stability)
- Third-party developers contribute extensions, customizations, and usability improvements
- End users (doctors, staff) benefit from a more practical, efficient system
To move in that direction, I propose the following:
1. Mapping Existing Implementations
- Identify how many Bahmni implementations exist
- Who manages them (implementers, hospitals, partners)
- What customizations have been done
- Whether these can be shared with the community
This gives visibility into real-world usage and existing solutions that can be reused.
2. Create a Non-Technical Community Platform
- A simple starting point could be a WhatsApp/Telegram group
- Include doctors, admins, implementers, senior hospital staff, and core team members
- Focus on daily operational challenges, workflows, usability—not just code
This bridges the gap between users and developers.
3. Build a “Marketplace” for Extensions
-
A platform where developers can publish:
- Plugins
- Add-ons
- Workflow improvements
-
Allow optional monetization
This is critical to attract external developers. Without visible adoption scale and demand, developer interest will remain low.
4. Introduce Feature Bounties
- Users vote on needed features
- Contributors build them for rewards
- Helps prioritize real-world needs outside core roadmap
5. Reduce Load on Core Team
- Decouple core development from feature expansion
- Let ecosystem handle customization layer
6. Shift in Software Expectations End users care about:
- Ease of use
- Speed
- Practical workflows
They do not prioritize:
- Tech stack
- Architecture purity
Example: legacy systems like Tally still dominate because they are efficient and user-friendly.
7. Focus on Practical Gaps (Especially Billing & UX) Current gaps:
- Billing workflows
- Financial usability
- Pharmacist/lab technician experience
- UI/UX efficiency
These are high-impact areas for adoption but currently under-addressed.
8. Conduct a Structured Survey A community-wide survey should capture:
- Current version in use
- Modules used (Bahmni, Odoo, OpenELIS, integrations)
- Pain points
- Customizations done
- Whether users switched away (and why)
Also, reach out to all past implementations for realistic feedback.
Conclusion If Bahmni needs to scale meaningfully:
- Visibility of adoption must improve
- Community engagement must expand beyond developers
- An extension ecosystem must be enabled
Without this, growth will remain limited to core-team bandwidth.
This thread aims to initiate that shift.
Summary
Hi …
Sorry for the delay in starting this thread.
This is a separate thread where i want to discuss on some crucial aspects of bahmni and how to take it forward by encouraging doctor and medical fratenity to come together along with core developers and probably reach out to thrid party developers to take bahmni ecosystem to next level where core developers can keep working on improving bahmni , adopting to openmrs latest version , while third party developers can develop features which can be enhance bahmni and help the end user ie doctors and staff to make thier daily routine much easier. To do this , i propose following
- First and foremost we need to find how many implementation has occurred , who is in charge , what sort of customization has occurred at that implementation and whether the implementer , doctor/admin wants to share those customization to the community ?
- Need an exclusive platform (even a simple Whatsapp group would be a great start imo) , where doctors , admins of hospital , implementers , Head staffs of hospital and core bahmni team can be part of this and discuss non-coding related stuff and day to day difficulties .
- I propose to core team to create a “MARKET PLACE” for extension / Customization where interested developers can create extensions , add-ons etc to expand the features of bahmni to make it at par with commercial HMS solutions and if needed the developers can monetize it. But to attract such developers we need to show our strength by putting up the numbers , usuage etc. Or else no developers will be interested.
- Along with the market place , we can also have bounties to develop a feature when users can vote for such feature. This again will attract the developers to develop such feature which are outside the purview of core team.
- These will help ease the load and bandwidth which the current team is facing.
- The way software is getting developed is drastically changing.. (vibe coding or not) , if a piece of software helps to get thing done , the end user doesnt care much imo on how or who is developing or how its developed. I know many hospitals running on pretty old codes and software , but since they get the basics right and easy for end user (mostly non-tech savy) , they are sticking to those. BEst example would be tally.. till date those who know tally can get everything done via keyboard itself.. 7.Improving Billing - As much as the core team is dedicated in bringing latest comptability and being as close to openMRS , we are missing on other fronts like financial aspect , user UX , how practical is it staff and pharmacist and lab techs.
- Creating a Survey and inviting doctors , admins , etc to respond would be a nice first step imo. This will give us idea how well it going for them , which version they are on ..what improvement they need , what difficulty they are facing , what components they are using (bahmni , odoo , openelis, xray integration etc) , or whether they have switched to other softwares.We should also call upon all implementation which has happened till date to get a real good feedback.