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