Finding an EHR With Online Tools

So, you want to dump your EHR and find another, or about to join the fray? Once you’ve got a handle on your requirements, this review lists some online tools that might help. Ideally, they’ll point to the one that’s best for you. Even if they can’t do that, they should help identify what you don’t want. Along the way, they may also raise some new issues, or give you some new insights.

Full Disclosure: I manage EHRSelector.com, but it’s not included.

Finding EHR Tools

The web has a surfeit of EHR evaluation tools. I’ve only reviewed those that are vendor independent and employ some filtering or ranking. That excludes spreadsheets and PDFs that just list features. I also skipped any that charge. I found the nine shown in Table I and reviewed below. Table II explains my definitions.


EHR Tool Table IEHR Tool Table II

EHR Tools Reviewed

1. American EHR. American’s tool gives you several ways to look at an EHR. Its side by side list compares 80 features. It asks users to rank a dozen features on a 1 to 5 scale. To use the tool, you pick a practice size and specialty. You can also see how users rated a product in detail, which shows how it stacks up against all its others. Unfortunately, its interface is a hit or miss affair. When you change a product choice sometimes it works and sometimes it just sits there.

2. Capterra. Capterra ranks the top 20 most popular EHRs, or at least the most well known. To do this, it adds up the number of customers, users and social media scores. That is, how often they’re mentioned on Twitter, Facebook, etc. Users rank products on a 1 to 5 scale and can add comments. It has a basic product filtering system.

3. Consumer Affairs. It examines ten major vendors using a short breakdown of features and user reviews. Users rate products on a 1 to 5 scale and can add comments.

4. EHR Compare. This tool solely relies on user ratings. Users score 20 EHR features on a 1 to 5 scale. It may add additional features depending on specialty. It only has a handful of reviews, which is a drawback.

5. EHR in Practice. EHR in Practice provides a short list of features and thumbnail EHR descriptions.

6. EHR Softwareinsider. This site uses ONC attestations to rank vendors. Its analysis shows those rankings along with Black Book ratings. Users rank products on a 1 to 10 scale. Interestingly, users can earn a $10 Amazon gift card for their reviews. For a fee, a vendor can move their product to the top of a list, though ES says that does not influence other factors.

7. Select Hub. There is one big if to using this site, if you can get in. As with some sites, SH requires that you register to get to its rankings. The problem is that once you do, you may wait for a day or more for a confirming email link. Even then, it didn’t see the confirmation, so I had to repeat, etc. If you get in, you’ll find some interesting features. Its staff briefly analyzes a product’s performance for each function. The other is that you can set up a project for yourself and others to query vendors.

8. Software Advice. Software Advice is a user rating site based on a 1 to 5 scale. It offers filters by rating rank, specialty and practice size as well as a short product summary.

9. Top Ten Reviews. As the name implies, Top Ten shows just that. There are two problems with its rankings. It doesn’t explain how it chose them or how they are ranked. It provides a thumbnail for each product.

What to Use. Several of the EHR comparison are just popularity contests. They have limited filters and depend on user reviews from whoever walks in the door. Two, however, go beyond that and are worth exploring: American EHR and Select Hub. Both have interface problems, but with persistence, you can find out more about a product than using the others.

With that said, you may also may find it useful to go through the user ranked tools. They may help you cull out particular products or interest you in one you’ve overlooked. Finally, if I’ve left something out, please let me know. I’ll add it in a revised post.

About the author

Carl Bergman

When Carl Bergman isn't rooting for the Washington Nationals or searching for a Steeler bar, he’s Managing Partner of EHRSelector.com.For the last dozen years, he’s concentrated on EHR consulting and writing. He spent the 80s and 90s as an itinerant project manager doing his small part for the dot com bubble. Prior to that, Bergman served a ten year stretch in the District of Columbia government as a policy and fiscal analyst, a role he recently repeated for a Council member.

   

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