The research firm also said that with more than 1,000 products in the health IT space, the current market is unsustainable and hospitals should expect more vendor mergers and acquisitions in the near future.
Cerner and McKesson take the top spots in the EHR market, according to a new report from research firm Kalorama Information. Epic and Allscripts follow in the next two slots, and both companies increased market share, according to the report: EMR 2016: The Market for Electronic Medical Records.
Kalorama said Cerner leads the market slightly over rival McKesson, the result of the company’s completed purchase of Siemens Healthcare’s EMR business in 2015.
GE Healthcare and Siemens reduced presence in the EMR market while what Kalorama called specialized firms, such as Epic and Allscripts, increased market share.
“Epic Systems has its share of supporters and critics,” the report notes. “However, the company continues to forge ahead landing sizeable contracts to implement their EHR system. Epic has a high price tag but that has not stopped the migration to Epic from such notable organizations such as the Providence Network and most recently CVS Caremark.”
[Also: Healthcare IT News’ EHR Satisfaction Survey results]
Epic moved from sixth to third place in Kalorama’s survey since 2012, while Allscripts moved from fifth to fourth over the same period. Not only did market share position increase for both companies, but both increased revenues from the previous year and have demonstrated stable growth.
The report also cites athenahealth, QSI/NextGen, GE Healthcare, MEDITECH, eClinicalWorks and Greenway and scores of other small EMR companies aimed at physician sales.
These firms are competing for a market worth more than $27 billion, according to Kalorama, which noted the market estimate includes not only EMR software but also training and consulting – offerings that generate considerable income in software and IT markets.
Kalorama also highlighted a flurry of mergers and acquisitions among EMR makers which, along with the trend of specialty EHR vendors pulling in increasing amounts of revenue during the last four years, is creating some concern among consumers wondering if their vendor will be around long after they purchase a given electronic health record system.
“At present, there are over 1,100 companies involved in the healthcare IT business in one aspect or another,” Kalorama publisher Bruce Carlson said in a statement. “This is not sustainable and so we are seeing consolidation activity.”
