Agency Offers Tips on How to Decide on EHR System
Not sure how to go about selecting an electronic health record (EHR) system for your healthcare facility? A federal agency has some tips and advice on what to consider.
The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) has written and posted an article on its website that lays out some recommended steps. In “How to Implement EHRs,” the office breaks the process down into six overall steps. The article appears to focus on the needs of medical practices, but much of the advice is applicable to healthcare facilities in general. For example, in the section on selecting or upgrading to a certified EHR, the article cites the need to consider an EHR system’s ability to integrate with other products and to also understand the system’s privacy and security capabilities.
Other tips and considerations include:
- Understand if and how a vendor’s product will accomplish your key goals.
- Clarify start-up pricing before selecting an EHR system, including hardware, software, maintenance and upgrade costs.
- Define implementation support.
- Clarify roles, responsibilities, and costs for data migration strategy if desired.
For more tips on how to select or upgrade to a certified EHR, click here to read the article by ONC.
Posted: November 19, 2012