Med Access EMR Blog

Free Beer Can make for a hangover!

2008-06-30T16:57:00.000-07:00

In BC there has recently been a large marketing push by some of the companies that profit from supporting open source EMR software. In one case, the spin is to liken the product to free beer! As an Englishman and a former rugby player I am drawn to that message! However free beer can lead to a hangover... It's important to base your decision making on fact, not spin or fear.

At Med Access we have a soft spot for the open source software providers. Much of our thinking is very similar. Med Access believes in using reputable open source tools and our users drive much of our innovation. However, there are some substantial benefits of our technology versus the open source code EMR. Those benefits are so great, the individuals marketing open source EMR do not try to take us on in a debate on areas such as:

How easy is the Software to use?
What functionality do you offer?
How easy is data input?
How quickly do you keep up with changes required for interfaces, funding remittance etc?
What tools do you offer to improve proactive health care?
What is the real cost of ownership over the life cycle of the product?
Is the product properly funded?

Instead, we tend to hear messages that raise fears around using a Provincially funded EMR. Such as:

The government will have access to your data.
You cannot keep your records private.
This will lead to payment for performance in an environment in which you have no control.

All very good points to consider when selecting an EMR. It's important to ensure that you have full control of your data and who sees it. With a Med Access, you do. Even in a funded ASP environment. That is an audited fact.

If you have fears around control of your data when selecting an EMR, by all means review what an open source solution can offer you. But also speak to tech savvy Doctors using Med Access. Ask them why they feel our solution actually has a lower cost of ownership. Then invite us to show you how we cover off 100% of your fears around control of patient data. While we are there, we will show you all the things you can do with our software you cannot do with an open source solution or any other EMR vendor. Once you have all the facts, you can decide.

For some Doctors that have the required technology skills, free time and risk tolerance, an open source solution may well be the best solution. I am not saying Med Access is always the best option for every Doctor, it is not. I am however recommending that every Doctor looking at open source EMR should take the time to review our software as well. We are the closest thing to open source EMR without any of the risks and hidden cost associated with that sector. Set aside the fears in the market to research the facts for yourself and then make a decision.

Free beer is never really free... we all know that. Yes, we charge you for what you drink. But our clients think it's a fair price, and the government will pay the majority of the cost for you. The nuts that come along with the free beer are expensive, and so is the taxi home! You don't have the risk of an accident driving yourself home after sampling our fine ales! We are fully accountable for the quality, stability and long term viability of our offerings. We invite you to research them for yourself. Please take the time to e-mail us questions if you have doubts or fears around using a Provincially funded EMR and you want to be connected to Doctors with teh same fears that over came them by selecting Med Access.

We are the biggest jerks in the market!

2008-04-11T11:50:00.000-07:00

This morning I was sent a link to an article that looked at 1998 compared to 2008 in terms of computer hardware. It was an interesting read, and I have provided the link below. It made me think... what will EMR look like in ten years?

Mathew Glotzbach, a senior executive with Google was asked at a recent tech expo to predict where he saw IT heading. His response was interesting; "The pace of change is too rapid for predictions."

I agree... However, we can safely predict that EMR, like every other technology, will become easier to use, faster, more functional and cheaper as time moves along. The rate of this change will increase rapidly in the next few years. This is the way of progress. As a shareholder in Med Access this excites me. Already, the technical and cost advantage our platform has given us, is leading to record growth. This advantage has allowed us to meet or exceed government standards months, sometimes even a year ahead of companies twice our size in the Alberta and BC markets. While others catch up on basic government requirements, we are innovating!

I expect this advantage to grow. Because the rate of change is accelerating... FAST! In science, the rate of change in acceleration is referred to as jerk. So... even though we have industry best customer retention... I have concluded; Med Access are the biggest jerks in the EMR market! And we are proud of it!!!

Our CIO Scott McFarlane is the UBER jerk! He predicted today's market and chose our technology platform long before the giant success stories of current times came to the fore. There are now many companies across different industries from large hospitals to Internet giants using the same standards based technology platforms as Med Access, and thriving because of it. It seems to me that the jerks will take over from the nerds in the new technology era. As a Father of two teenage girls, this worries me! I used to tell them, be nice to the nerds, they will make the kindest and best husbands years from now, and they will be rich! Now I have to encourage them to look out for guys who will be jerks when they are older!

So as you are reading, think about your EMR and the technology platform it is built upon. Can it keep up with the jerks? I predict in the next ten years at least three EMR companies larger than Med Access will be out of business and about 50 smaller ones will also cease to exist. If I had to predict who our major competition will be in ten years.. I would guess a company that is not even formed yet. I know that sounds bizarre, but it is a real possibility.

Just as the best restaurants have to totally overhaul their interior every two years to keep attracting clientele; we may have to overhaul our technology platform every five years to stay in business in the future. For now, we have the luxury of running the most advanced platform in the EMR marketplace . So the clients in the Med Access restaurant have a bigger menu to choose from, it's easier to get served, they get their food faster and pay less!

If you're interested in having the jerks from Med Access cook up an EMR for you, just call or click... We are listening!

1998 versua 2008:

http://www.pcworld.ca/news/column/e771126e0a01040801d1f9679e438c59/pg1.htm

How Much does Size Matter?

2008-04-08T15:15:00.001-07:00

A few potential clients have told me recently that our competitors warn against choosing Med Access because of the risks of choosing a "smaller" company. I have a few responses to that:

1. Hark at the kettle calling the pot back! - Its an old Yorkshire saying, and I am sure you get the gist! This is an emerging market and every EMR company is small. For good reasons, the medical profession has been slow to uptake on technology. As a result, if you combine all of the sales, of all the vendors selling EMR in Western Canada.... The number would be dwarfed by even the 20th largest company selling software for the purpose of automating for engineering professionals in the same geography!

2. How thinly do you spread your butter? Med Access has 40 employees serving a very small defined market in Western Canada. Some of our competitors have 10-20 more serving all of Canada! One has 100 employees, but they are global! In some cases EMR is not their main business.

Med Access was first to be compliant in BC, and have always been VCUR compliant in Alberta. One of the main reasons is, our staff to target market ratio is the highest by far. Yes.. there are more employees at other companies but they cannot keep up with all of the requirements in Western Canada as well as Med Access, that is a well documented fact. In real terms, our focus on only EMR, only in Western Canada makes Med Access the big player in our market place!

3. Different strokes for different folks. Some of our competition has raised millions in government grants from their country of origin or in investment dollars. A strategy that can be very effective if you can grow fast enough. Med Access prefers slower growth funded on our profits. We have a base of 3,000 clients and it is growing, at a faster rate than any of our competition in Western Canada.

4. Doctors are too smart for FUD! Fud is an old business term normally used when one company has an advantage over another. The company with the higher price / older technology (or whatever the case may be) tries to use the tactic of spreading fear uncertainty and doubt! It can be a very successful tactic, remember IBM's slogan... "nobody gets fired buying IBM." It worked like a charm. You have to be the size of IBM to carry that off though! While everyone buys with a certain amount of emotion, I don't see FUD working in our market place. The collective Governments in Western Canada have done a good job ensuring only viable companies can sell into their provinces.

5. Mince-meat for supper again! This is what my Mother would often say to my two siblings and I when we were kids. My Father went back to University to get a second degree and we were pretty poor as a result! Mum got very creative at cooking meals with the lowest cost meat. She believed in doing more with less. And so does the staff of Med Access. Today, thanks to technology our clients get steak and pay mince-meat prices! Our technology platform gives us this advantage. If we had a legacy software platform we would probably have to be about 15-20 employees more than we are. you the customer would be paying the wages of those staff!

In closing, I don't think size matters that much once you get beyond a certain point. Governments filter out those too small to support your practice properly during RFP's. Of course, I would never say that you should not buy from a bigger more expensive company. Some of these sized organizations are very stable and the undisputed leaders in their field. When I buy a computer... I buy a MAC , not a clone. However, there are no companies of Apple's ilk in our market space, and if anyone is going to invent the EMR I-Pod equivalent, based on past history, you would bet on Med Access to be the one! Some would argue we already have!

If you have any thoughts on this subject blog, or e-mail. I get lots of e-mail on these topics and more is always welcome. Call or click, we are listening...

How to tell if your clinic is using Med Access (tongue in cheek!)

2008-04-02T13:11:00.000-07:00

If you are unsure if your current EMR is Med Access, ask yourself the following questions. If the answer to any of them is YES... I can assure you. You are not using Med Access!

Are you being asked to spend extra money on SQL licenses?

Are you being asked to spend extra money on Citrix licenses?

Is it complicated to do simple tasks?

Do you call your EMR vendor for support and someone from another company, country or both answers?

Have you tried to use your software from a hospital and the firewall has blocked it?

Is your funding in doubt because your current provider cannot stay compliant with the ever changing government regulations?

Does your program look "Dos" like?

Was your training given to you in a pre-packaged one size fits all method?

Are you frustrated that your specialized needs cannot be met by the solution?

Do you have to go "searching" for information that should be just one click away?

When another Doctor in the clinic runs a report, does your screen slow up?

Did you sign up for a low price which keeps going up every time you store more data?

Is your software built on old technology not originally designed to run on the web?

If the answer to the last question was YES, chances are you answered YES to most of the other questions. Older technology can be much more complicated to operate. Normally it's noticeably slower and expensive to upgrade too. Plus, when when you the upgrade, you have to foot the bill for all the additional licenses.

On that note... Beware; If you are running an EMR on a server in your clinic and you are going change to a new web based solution from your current legacy vendor you may want ask them about the additional license fees hidden in the costs. You should also be asking about performance issues...

Now... think about the pace of change in technology. This pace is not linear... it it accelerates with every passing day. If you are three, five or twenty years behind today. Where do you think will you be in five years? Mathematically you may say five, eight or twenty five years behind. In reality it will feel like a hundred years.

Already Med Access can sell a more featured, faster product than any of the legacy companies, at a lower price. This despite the fact that many have more developers and in most cases, they have raised millions of dollars in government grants or venture capital money to fund their development. We fund our innovation with our own profit.

Our sales growth this year has been prolific. As we invest that money back into research and development we believe the technology gap will grow. If you are using technology that is twenty years old, you have to hire 5-10 developers to do what we can with one new hire. Even then, it will cost the end user more, and there will likely still be a noticeable performance gap. In as little as two years we will be able to add a whole new, much longer set of questions to the list above.

Customers tell us all the time "we love your software but to change will be painful" and they are right! However, unless you are retiring soon... You may have a lot more pain coming over the long haul, both financially and otherwise if your planning to stick with a legacy solution.

One last question... why are you paying for SQL licenses or Citrix licenses or even both when you could be spending less on a great EMR built on the latest open source technology used by many of the major players the tech market?

The answer to that question may be our fault... we have focused so hard on technology, maybe we have not got around to see you yet. We will be coming to your area soon... make sure you get invited! Please go to http://www.med-access.net/ and tell us who you are, what you currently use and how to contact your clinic to ensure you are invited to our up-coming events in your area. Come and hear about why we are so radically different from the legacy based companies and decide for yourself.

Just call or click. We are listening...

Risk versus reward, when is switching from one EMR to another worth the hassle?

2008-03-20T10:09:00.001-07:00

I was talking to a Doctor yesterday who is a fan of our product and a current user of another. He made one comment which I felt deserved some discussion.
"Switching is painful, but keeping what I have is painful too"

So when is it worth the hassle of switching, and when are you better off sticking with a known solution even if it is not so good. There are no definitive answers, but here are some thoughts...

If your current solution is not funded, and you can get a better solution that is then you really should switch. That's an easy decision to make as the financial case to switch is so compelling, that even a moving away from a product that does not offer a data export would make sound long term sense.

So what about if your current EMR is eligible for funding, but you recognize another product is going to serve your needs substantially better? If you are moving between vendors that can provide a T.O.P.D export (Transfer of Patient Data, a standard implemented by the Alberta government.) you have an increased chance of success. Med Access wrote the T.O.P.D utility for the Alberta government so we can advise you on the pros and cons. However, even with a standards based conversion there are always issues. Beware the salesman who speaks of "seamless transfer of Data." There is no such thing!

If you are a BC Doctor, even if you currently use a product from a P.I.T.O approved vendor you have no choice but to go through a data transfer if you want to remain funded. Whether it is from your current product to the A.S.P/P.I.T.O offering, or from your current product to another. Obviously there will also be additional training issues to deal with switching vendors. However, if you are not happy with your product or support, or both... the optimal time to time to review the risks and rewards of switching would be when you are allocated your funding.

So if you are using a product that is not T.O.P.D compliant, but you still want to look at switching, or because of funding issues you are being forced to... what are your options? This is where it gets complex. You will have to first see what kind of an export your current provider will supply / sell to you and then have your new vendor of choice give you an appraisal of the import. There is no one size fits all type answer, but if you contact Med Access we can give you an honest opinion on your specific data set. If it's not viable, we will tell you... we don't take on projects we cannot succeed at!

Of course you do always have the option of a manual switch, treating the old EMR data as you did your paper files when you first moved over. It's longer and somewhat painful for the staff but you will save the export / import costs and you won't lose any data. The good news is; the pleasure of using a great EMR that can keep up with change lasts a lot longer than the short term pain of manual entry.

And so we return to our original question... Are the rewards of switching EMR's worth the risk? the short answer is;
"Yes if your current EMR is not funded. Possibly if both products concerned are T.O.P.D compliant. Maybe not if you cannot get a good data export, but maybe still so if you have a long term perspective and you don't want to be held hostage to outdated technology!"

Yes, that truly is the short answer! The long answer can only be addressed on an individual case basis. But if you can get an honest appraisal of the pros and cons you are in a better position to make a sound business decision.

If you have been through a switch, let us know your experience and on hindsight was the risk worth the reward. We are listening...

Community EMR

2008-03-18T08:02:00.003-07:00

Med Access had a vision of community EMR in mind when we first designed our technology platform. Now, it is an exciting time in our history as we are in the process of implementing the largest community EMR in Canada. It seems heath care professionals are ready for integrated health networks in the clinic, and large scale collaboration in the community.

We have the technology, but we would love to hear your ideas... How do you see EMR solutions actually helping you to execute patient care in a collaborative way? What does patient access mean to you? What should it not include? How can we effectively facilitate information sharing between the Specialist and the G.P?

These are issues we have built functionality to address. However, today's solution is never good enough for tomorrow's new reality. Change is a constant. Please share your thoughts on where you see community EMR heading and how we can help ensure our clients remain leaders in this field. We are listening...

How are you going to choose an EMR? Don't forget Content, Context and Proactive Alerts.

2008-03-18T08:02:00.001-07:00

Health Care professionals all over Canada are currently evaluating software vendors. There are many issues to take into account. How will it model my environment? How will it keep up with changes in regulations and best practices in the future? How happy are the current customers of the product? How much will it cost me? These are all valid evaluation criteria. I have heard a lot of great discussion on this subject and I am going to invite some of the health care professionals I know and respect to comment. However, in addition to their comments, I would ask you to consider a few other issues that seem to be somewhat neglected in the decision criteria...

On September 12th 2001 I got a call from my investment advisor. He let me know the markets had crashed. When I asked what to do, he let me know he was just giving me the "information" and there was no way to figure out what to do as this was an unprecedented event.

In an EMR, you have a lot of information. Content. Most of the software you can buy has the same basic data in it. So regardless of which product you choose the information is available to you.

At the same time I received the call from my advisor, some people around the world were getting the same calls but with some added information. Context. They were been given a history of the other times that disasters had hit the markets, how low they fell and how long it took for them to recover.

How do the EMR vendors you are looking at put context around the data they serve up? How easily available is it? How often is this contextual information updated? What is the source? These are all very important questions that all too often go without being asked.

Now had my broker been really sharp he would have called me when the second plane went into the twin towers and told me how to proactively manage my portfolio. Proactive Alerts. Had he contacted me at that time and told me of how disasters had effected the markets in the past and what I should do to insulate myself from the effects he would probably still be my broker today! While good brokers stared at the screen in disbelief, great brokers were on the phones setting buy targets for key stocks to help their clients off-set the damage.

And so it is with great software. Good software gives you all the information you need. Very good software makes it easily available with context to support your decision making. Great software will help you to manage the health care of your patients in a proactive way.

Incorporating an EMR is a lot of work. If, as a result of the investment you practice in the same way as you do today only electronically is it really worth the investment, time and effort?

There is a lot to consider when making a long term investment in an EMR, or considering a switch from your current EMR to another vendor. When you are evaluating the different vendors take some time out from features and functions that serve up data to study the contextual information available and even better, ask how the software can proactively alert you in ways that are meaningful to patient care.

So what do you think is often overlooked in an EMR selection process? Please share yoru thoughts with our users and guests to the site. We are listening...