The regional health information organization (RHIO) movement is impacting ambulatory EMR development, according to Jared Peterson, director of operations for KLAS. “Organizations want to get their physicians more involved and be able to share information within the enterprise and then with hospitals,” he said. Large physician groups’ main concern is to be able to seamlessly share data–from the doctor’s office to the hospital–and see such clinical data as lab results and PACs images. The following ranked list for Ambulatory EMRs for large physicians groups is based on The Top 20: 2005 Year-End Best in KLAS report. KLAS will be releasing its June 2006 report after the publication of the June issue of Healthcare IT News.
jared@healthcomputing.com

Epic

EpicCare Ambulatory EMR

Klas Rank No. 1

Features: EpicCare Ambulatory is consistently ranked as a top EMR by leading industry evaluators. Ambulatory was the first successful EMR and continues to lead the industry today. Major features include multi-specialty support, workflow management, encounter and charting templates, ACPOE, e-prescribing, point-of-care clinical and financial decision support, automated health maintenance, support for disease and population management, research capabilities, CMV integration and knowledge management that promotes evidence-based medicine. Epic’s MyChart shared record gives patients secure Web access to their EpicCare records. AffiliateLink offers similar connectivity for community physicians.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? Yes. Epic’s use of a single database creates an integrated practice management and clinical system that introduces many benefits, including the ability to automatically drop charges into Epic’s Resolute billing application and to schedule orders with Epic’s Cadence scheduling application. This integration also makes schedules, patient benefit summaries and expected patient visit charges available for review within EpicCare workflows with no need for interfacing. Insurance information documented in Epic can trigger Medical Necessity warnings and notifications of non-formulary prescriptions at the point of ordering. Clients have the option of using interfaced external billing and scheduling systems with EpicCare as well.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes. Epic’s system can employ interfaces to exchange data with hospital systems, as well as use CCOW context management to simplify access to patient information in another application. No interfaces are necessary between EpicCare Ambulatory and Epic’s hospital systems.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes. It supports all types of patient orders, and decision support can recommend orders appropriate to patients’ conditions. Virtually all physicians using EpicCare Ambulatory use its order entry functions. EpicCare identifies preferred prescriptions at the point of ordering, maintains a medications history, warns providers of interactions, duplicate therapy and prescriptions outside the patient’s insurance formulary; and sends prescriptions via interface or fax. Renewal requests are managed within EpicCare. Encounter templates let providers create complete documentation with just a few actions. Charting methods include structured physical exam and review of systems forms, text templates, flowsheets, graphical image annotations, speech recognition and free text. Epic’s charting tools typically lead to dramatic reductions in dictation/transcription. In addition to encounter-level data, EpicCare captures patient-level data such as chronic medical problems and histories that do not need to be re-entered each time the patient is seen.

InteGreat

IC-Chart

Klas Rank No. 2 

Features: IC-Chart lets you build and access complete electronic health records. Effective for medical practices and community health centers, this intuitive, state-of-the-art software is affordable, browser-based, easy to use and highly customizable. Because IC-Chart is browser-based and incorporates check boxes and pick lists, you can quickly adapt the system to your own work habits. IC-Chart includes: IC-Script, IC-Imaging, IC-Orders and IC-Encounters.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? IC-Chart is a comprehensive electronic health record that can be interfaced with any billing and scheduling system.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? IC-Chart can interface with hospital systems using HL7.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes.

Allscripts

TouchWorks Electronic Health Record

Klas Rank No. 3 

Features: The award-winning TouchWorks Electronic Health Record features a unique modular design that enables rapid implementation in as few as 30 days. With workflow integration and advanced task management, TouchWorks streamlines the operations of a busy practice. The EHR comes complete with a fully integrated document imaging technology to enable physician practices to achieve a true paperless office.  Its point-of-care charge capture eliminates lost charges and enhances revenue wit improved reimbursement.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? The TouchWroks EHR is integrated with the TouchWorks Practice Management System. The applications can be installed separately or as an integrated system.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes.

NextGen Healthcare Information Systems 

NextGen EMR

Klas Rank No, 4

Features: NextGen EMR lets physicians quickly create and manage electronic medical records at the point of care, in a fast, familiar, Windows-based environment. Providers can easily customize the family practice or vast specialty templates to document histories, diagnoses, medications, labs, procedures and more. Automatic E&M coding and single-database integration with NextGen’s practice management system facilitates scheduling of patients and electronic posting of charges.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? Yes.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes.

GE Healthcare

GE Centricity Physician Office Electronic Medical Record (EMR)

Klas Rank No. 5  

Features: Centricity EMR enables ambulatory care physicians and clinical staff to document patient encounters, streamline clinical workflow and securely exchange clinical data with other providers, patients and information systems. Centricity EMR is used by thousands of physicians to manage millions of patient records–making it the most widely used ambulatory care electronic medical record.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? No.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes. With Centricity EMR, lab results, transcriptions, radiology images and more are automatically imported and attached to the patient record. This is a flexible system with substantial ability to integrate with disparate hospital systems, either custom or off-the-shelf, using HL7 standards.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes. Centricity EMR’s user-friendly CPOE, embedded decision support and medication checking tools help clinicians prevent medication errors. E-prescribing is built-in, and you can improve your organization’s cost control with Centricity EMR’s electronic formularies. The system’s electronic encounter forms can be customized to facilitate efficient data entry, and care providers can exchange chart notes, referrals, lab results and clinical messages with other providers.

Misys EMR

Misys Healthcare Systems

Klas Rank No. 6

Features: Interoperability technology for seamless integration with other IT systems; Misys Connect, a Web-based patient and clinical data sharing solution; enhanced ePrescribing, which connects to more than 40,000 pharmacies; clinical decision support tools helps reduce medical errors; pay-for-performance revenue solutions supports DOQ-IT and HEDIS reporting; standards-based interfaces provide full integration with labs, pharmacies and imaging systems; specialty-specific templates; comprehensive charting features; orders management; expanded E&M coding wizard; charge passing; in-bound task queue; patient photograph screen and enhanced prenatal flowsheets.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? Yes. Misys EMR shares a single relational database with the Misys Vision practice management system. Misys EMR uses a separate database that integrates seamlessly with the Misys Tiger practice management system.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes. Misys EMR is built on technology that provides HL7-standards based interoperability, as well as expanded interfaces with other IT systems.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes. Misys EMR has several options for e-prescribing, which include medication management modules, drug interaction reviews and alerting and medication reference information. Misys EMR also features document and charting tools, which include pre-defined, specialty-specific templates, advanced chart noting and coding assistance.

Cerner

PowerChart Office

Klas Rank No. 7 

Features: PowerChart Office leverages our industry-leading Millennium architecture in its 12th release and is the foundation for 4,300 live solutions at 860 client facilities worldwide. It makes clinicians’ lives easier by providing a common dashboard and set of work activities as they move from home, to office, to hospital. It provides quick access to the most relevant information needed for current decisions, is optimized for common tasks and anticipates what’s next within a clinician’s workflow.

Are your billing, scheduling and EMR applications in a single integrated database? Yes.

Can your system interface with disparate hospital systems? Yes.

Does your system have CPOE, e-prescribing, and electronic document and charting capabilities? Yes.