The answer is fairly simple – the technology offered by these older EHRs does not meet today’s healthcare information requirements.
That is why, according to KLAS, a health IT research firm, by 2016 almost 50% of hospitals will have replaced their current EHRs. In another survey conducted by EHR buyer resource Software Advice during the first quarter of 2014, it was reported that 40% of EHR buyers said they wanted to swap out their EHRs.
The main reason for this massive switch is that these older EHR technologies do not leverage the latest technologies — like the cloud computing and single database platforms. These are the very technologies that the rural, small community and critical access (CAH) hospitals need to meet the emerging needs of today’s and tomorrow’s healthcare information environment. Today’s EHRs must support improved care coordination, a pay for performance model and an accountable care environment.
Most of the older, client server-based EHR technologies cannot support these informational needs.
Federal reporting mandates and interoperability requirements are making the ability to collect and exchange health information vital for any hospital’s success. Compliance with these mandates is a burden for many hospitals, especially smaller community and CAH hospitals – unless they have the right technology platform. A single database platform facilitates the exchange of information that must be managed, and saves clinicians time spent on repeated data entry, ultimately improving workflow efficiencies and patient care. A single database also minimizes system maintenance and IT involvement, and centralizes updates to patient information.
Another important benefit of single database architecture is that it includes clinical, financial management and ambulatory (outpatient) information all in one place, providing clinicians with a truly integrated experience. This provides for sophisticated interactions between the clinical and financial areas of your hospital, as well as any associated medical practices.
When this single database EHR system is delivered via cloud-based technology, a hospital’s clinical and financial information are stored securely on external servers, designed for fast, secure web-based access from wherever a user has an Internet connection.
A cloud-based, non-modular EHR solution offers a sophisticated, yet uncomplicated technology approach that can be quickly comprehended by both IT staff members and healthcare clinicians who have little or no computer experience. A scalable, secure, pay-as-you-use cloud-based EHR solution also helps rural hospitals deploy their EHR systems more quickly and at a lower cost by eliminating the need to purchase expensive hardware.
There are many benefits to a single database, cloud-based EHR solution. First, cloud-based EHRs are provided through Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) contracts, allowing small hospitals to pay for the services on a low monthly subscription basis which provides better cost transparency and consistency in the hospital’s expenditures. Implementation fees are also much lower compared to a client-server based EHR solution, because there is little or no hardware to be installed on site.
For all of the foregoing reasons, rural, small community and CAH hospitals are harnessing these proven technologies to meet their 21st century EHR information needs.
