Dr. Lang certainly did. Now, since at that moment he basically had me in a headlock, I was a seriously captive audience. I also didn't have a pen or paper or the leverage to take notes. After he did one of those elbow-down wrestling drops on the middle of my back, I offered to call him later and conduct a more proper interview. And that's just what I did. I'll tell you his story a little later in the article.

As I thought more about Lang's story, I realized that getting ROI accounts directly from readers, in their own words, would be one really good way to showcase ROI. It's much more empirical, meaning it's not derived from a formula. Instead, it's all based on real experiences. Since we have one of the best laboratories for Palm analysis and research here at PalmPower's Enterprise Edition--in the sense that we've got a ton of you readers, all with your own experiences--it seemed to make the most sense to tap that resource in my quest for the holy grail of ROI knowledge.

That, in fact, is just what I've done here in this article. I posted requests for stories on our News Page and selected some that I thought were most interesting. First, I'll start with Jim Lang's story about how he's saving money and time. Then you'll hear from a doctor who won't put a price on his Palm handheld, other than that he's convinced it's helped him save lives. You'll hear from a number of business people who have quantified some data, a dentist who trimmed a 30-minute process down to 3 minutes, and even a retired fellow who's using Palm handhelds to help out with disabled veterans.

First, let's start with my favorite neck-yanker.

Saving paperwork and saving money
Dr. James V. Lang, D.C., like many other medical professionals, has to take a lot of time preparing paperwork for insurance companies. Often, when processing a claim, insurance companies require what are called SOAP (Subjective Objective Assessment and Plan) notes. These are daily treatment notes and observations for each patient.

Because, when done by hand, taking SOAP notes was a pain, it didn't get done for all patients. Full SOAP notes were only taken for those who were likely to need an insurance reimbursement, and more simplistic notes were taken for those patients who didn't have insurance. Worse, on the occasions that the insurance companies requested SOAP notes, preparing them was a challenge. Rushed notes were taken in the middle of the doctor's day, between patients, and usually were in poor handwriting, very cryptic, and difficult to decipher. Yet they had to be completely rewritten and retyped. It would often take a free afternoon to an entire day to do this work. And we know how many free days most practicing doctors have available.

Lang bought a Palm handheld and found a product called Auto-Doc (at http://www.auto-doc.com), which captures SOAP note data, including change findings, ranges of motion, findings of X-rays, and so forth. Now he downloads a schedule of patients into the Palm handheld. After patient visits, he picks up his handheld and simply by pointing and tapping in the Auto-Doc program, he selects the answers that describe treatment for each of his patients. So now he can keep detailed notes for all his patients, and not shortchange those without insurance. When it's time for a report to the insurance company, a simple HotSync brings the data back to his PC, and he can generate the report.