Most Physicians Say EHR Vendors Offer Poor Interoperability

A majority of providers said their electronic health record vendors are not interoperable with other vendors’ EHR systems, according to a new report from KLAS Research, Healthcare IT News reports (McCann, Healthcare IT News, 10/8).

Report Details

For the report, researchers surveyed 220 provider organizations about EHR interoperability. The EHR vendors used by the respondents were:

• Allscripts;
• athenahealth;
• Cerner;
• eClinicalWorks;
• Epic;
• GE Healthcare;
• Greenway;
• McKesson;
• MEDITECH;
• NextGen; and
• Siemens .

Report Findings

Overall, the report found:

• 82% of respondents said they had been at least “moderately successful” in achieving EHR interoperability;
• Fewer than 50% of respondents said their EHR vendors “cooperate well with others;” (Healthcare IT News, 10/8); and
• Just 6% of respondents said they had achieved advanced interoperability .

When asked about vendor collaboration efforts such as the CommonWell Health Alliance:

• 51% of respondents said they were either not familiar, unsure or had no opinion on such efforts;
• 31% of respondents said they were “skeptical” of such efforts; and
• 18% of respondents said they were optimistic about collaborative efforts.

In addition, 20% of respondents said they used health information exchanges to help achieve interoperability, while 32% said there were no interoperability features or platforms that helped them improve care delivery.

Meanwhile, nearly 85% of respondents who use athenahealth as their EHR vendor gave above average marks for interoperability. Other vendors that received high marks from a majority of their customers included:

• Allscripts;
• Cerner;
• Epic;
• GE Healthcare; and
• MEDITECH.

In addition, providers indicated that Allscripts, athenahealth and Epic performed best at containing costs and facilitating interfaces