Quick answer
What to do
Write tests based on the work your clinic does, then mark which requirements must be ready on the first day and which can wait. Record what you actually observe about task completion, exceptions, data access, security, setup, integrations, support, accessibility, pricing, and contract terms. Keep unknown answers visible and have clinic staff test the highest-risk tasks. A scorecard organizes the decision, but it does not verify a vendor’s claims for you.
Choose a small team that does the work being tested
Include people who schedule, room, document, check out, manage inventory or finances, administer access, and make the final decision. Give one person responsibility for the requirements list, evidence log, vendor questions, and version control so each product is scored against the same standard.
Before viewing products, ask each role for the three tasks that must become easier and the two failures the clinic cannot accept. Separate day-one requirements from useful later improvements. A long undifferentiated feature list makes every product look equally incomplete.
Ask vendors to complete clinic tasks instead of listing features
Ask a product to complete representative work: place a new-client appointment, respond to a change request, check in a patient with an allergy, resume and sign a SOAP draft, carry charges to checkout, correct a payment exception, receive two lots with different expirations, and locate an owner callback.
Include one problem in every test. Count how often staff re-enter the client or patient, note where work waits, check whether a task has a named owner, and confirm that the next person gets the information needed to continue. Record pass, partial, fail, setup required, not available, or not tested instead of forcing every result into yes or no.
Ask who can see the data and how the clinic can export it
Review role configuration, least-privilege options, authentication, session controls, audit history, signed-record behavior, corrections, backups, incident handling, data location, retention options, and client or patient record access. Ask which controls are included, configurable, provider-dependent, or planned.
Request sample exports for clients, patients, appointments, clinical records, documents, balances, inventory, and audit history. Check the file format, identifiers that preserve relationships, attachments, export frequency, and process for obtaining a complete copy. Have qualified advisors review privacy, security, professional, and legal requirements; a checklist cannot certify compliance.
Verify every integration and outside service by name
For payments, text, email, laboratories, imaging, accounting, pharmacy, telephony, or vision extraction, identify the actual provider. Ask whether it is connected, which way data moves, who sets it up, what staff see when it fails, who provides support, and what the clinic does without it. “Integrates with” is not a complete answer.
Test at least one failure or disconnected state. Can staff see that a message was not delivered? Does a payment remain unposted? Can a handwritten page be preserved if vision is not configured? Record what is available today, what requires setup, and what is only planned.
Find out what setup entails before choosing
Ask for responsibilities and acceptance criteria for data migration, configuration, templates, users and roles, devices, provider connections, training, rehearsals, cutover, and post-launch support. Identify what the clinic must supply, who performs validation, and how unresolved defects are tracked.
Request current pricing and full contract terms directly from each vendor, including implementation, migration, support, provider, hardware, usage, renewal, exit, and data-export terms where applicable. This guide does not state or compare vendor prices or contracts; those details can change and should be verified in writing.
Score what you observed and keep unknowns visible
Set requirement weights before the final demonstrations. Link each score to something the team observed, current documentation, a configured test, or a written vendor answer. Score “unknown” separately from “fail.” An unanswered question is not proof that a feature exists.
Review results by clinic task and risk, not only by the total score. A product can earn points for small conveniences and still fail at clinical documentation or getting complete charges to checkout. Record disagreements and the assumptions behind the decision so the team can revisit them during setup.
Reusable template
Evidence-based evaluation scorecard
Use one row per requirement. Weight the row before product review and require a source for every score.
REQUIREMENT — Observable task or outcome, not a feature label.
OWNER — Clinic role responsible for validating the workflow.
PRIORITY — Day-one blocker, day-one important, later, or out of scope.
WEIGHT — Relative impact chosen before scoring products.
RESULT — Pass, partial, fail, setup required, not available, or not tested.
EVIDENCE — Live scenario, configured test, current documentation, sample export, or written response.
EXCEPTION — What happens when data, a provider, or the expected user action is missing?
FOLLOW-UP — Open question, owner, due date, and decision impact.
Sources and scope
How this guide was prepared
This worksheet does not certify a product’s security, privacy, accessibility, legality, or compliance. The NIST and CISA sources below provide general technology-purchasing guidance; they do not approve veterinary software. Ask for current written evidence, test the product as configured for your clinic, and involve qualified reviewers where needed. The source pages below were checked July 12, 2026.
- 1NIST SP 1326: Cybersecurity Supply Chain Risk Management Due Diligence Assessment Quick-Start GuideNational Institute of Standards and Technology / checked July 12, 2026
- 2Software Acquisition Guide for Government Enterprise ConsumersCybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency / checked July 12, 2026
- 3Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2World Wide Web Consortium / checked July 12, 2026