Welcome to EMR and EHR

I got the following email from an EMR vendor that highlights a number of interesting things about what it’s like for customers interacting with their EMR vendor. It’s very much in line with the experiences I’ve seen and heard. I’ve removed the specific EMR vendor names since the names don’t matter as much as the general experience. Instead I’ve used “small EMR vendor” and “large EMR vendor” and “ePrescribing solution.”

I was looking for an ePrescribe solution to interface to our small EMR vendor about a year ago and settled on using ePrescribing solution. As you probably know, they bailed out of the business and sold their service to large EMR vendor. Now we’ve interfaced our product with theirs.

The thing that makes me chuckle is my clients beat me up all the time on saving “clicks” and yet they don’t say a negative thing about the steps associated with large EMR vendor. I guess its because they know I have control over my product and they realize there is zero from the large EMR vendor.

As an observation, questions and low-level technical support was very, very good from the old ePrescribing solution. It appears to be non-existent with large EMR vendor – maybe because they’re busy dealing with so many conversions from the purchased ePrescribing solution? Don’t know. I also know from first-hand experience that support is rather poor with large EMR vendor.

On EMR and HIPAA I did a post about healthcare IT Projects you can implement today. The basic concept is that you can work on other IT projects if you’re not quite ready to implement an EMR (for example if you’re waiting to learn more about the EMR stimulus money). Dan Draper stopped by and left an additional comment about an additional side benefit of doing an IT project before implementing an EMR (emphasis added):

Besides the direct benefit these projects deliver, taking baby steps with technology will make a big implementation easier. In these small IT implementations, I would recommend clinics and offices take the opportunity to evaluate IT integrators, network engineers and value-added resellers.

Use these small projects to find out which IT reseller really understands the challenge of healthcare (critical data/no on-site IT support) and won’t leave a doctor or administrator with a hot closet, a mess of cables or an infrastructure that won’t easily expand. Use this opportunity to ask the integrator or reseller what the IT costs and scope would be for that future (eventual) EMR implementation.

Very fine points. If you don’t think your relationship with your IT support help is important, you’re in real trouble during an EMR implementation. Done right, you won’t really notice they’re there. Done wrong, and let the finger pointing begin.