eClinicalWorks CEO Girish Navani said the company will be focusing on three technological developments at HIMSS18.

It’s been quite a year for the vendor since HIMSS17. In May it settled a False Claims lawsuit with the U.S. Department of Justice, which was followed by a $1 billion class-action suit in November and another class-action complaint in December, for which the specific amount remains to be determined.

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Along the way, however, the company won a string of new customers, including Digestive CARE saying in mid-January its 28 offices went live with eClinicalWorks, and released version 11 of its EHR – which Navani said customers will be deploying in January and February of 2018.

And at HIMSS18, the company is focusing on “elevating an EHR from the traditional mindset of data entry to smartness and intelligence that helps doctors,” Navani said.

Three examples that will be on display at the health IT conference are the Open and Connected Office, Virtual reality and precision medicine features and functionality within the EHR.

eClinicalWorks EHR, specifically, can now integrate genetic screening and results into the order entry process, Navani said.

“Not only do we have the ability to order that test as easily as doctors can order a blood test but going forward the lab will send the results back into the EHR,” Navani added. “At the point of entry the physician writes an order, like a medication, and it validates that against the genetic profile.”  

On the artificial intelligence front, eClinicalWorks’ new iteration also includes Eva, a virtual reality assistant not altogether unlike Apple’s Siri. Clinicians say “Hello Eva,” and Eva responds with choices pertaining to tasks doctors typically do during an office visit, such as select a patient by name, send messages without interrupting the workflow, open a progress note, or ask Eva to add a new diagnosis to the problem list, among other operations.

“Why cannot I ask the EHR to do things for me?” Navani said. “Or ask it questions? Or better yet have it just tell me what I should do?”  

Navani said the Open and Connected Office features, which are underpinned by the company’s FHIR-based interoperability hub, will enable clinicians to visually see every health system they can now interoperate with by clicking on a menu item, then opting to connect so they can see how other doctors are treating a particular patient.

“This is like the ATM network. But you don’t have to pay that $3 transaction fee,” Navani said, explaining that most Epic and many Cerner hospitals are already on this via Carequality’s end-users agreement that hospitals sign or the Commonwell Health Alliance, wherein patient level consent happens at check-in time.  

“Interoperability will become a given and what we do with the information will be the next level of innovation,” Navani said.

Speaking of next levels, Navani also gave a glimpse of where eClinicalWorks technology is headed post-HIMSS18.  

“We’re getting into the acute care side by the middle of the year,” Navani said. “It’s not just the provider side, we’re doing the same thing for the patient side, telemedicine, a kiosk, messaging, all of the above.”

Much like the way so many Enterprise Resource Planning companies once made giant software packages and that was all they sold but many have evolved into broader offerings, Navani said EHR vendors will become patient relationship management companies.

“Machine learning is coming. You will see some real applicability,” Navani said. “Machine learning at least to help a doctor is going to be en vogue as third-party companies build interesting models EHRs can include.”

eClinicalWorks will be in Booths 145 and 11955 at HIMSS18 at the Venetian - Sands Expo Center in Las Vegas. HIMSS18 runs from March 5-9, 2018.

Twitter: SullyHIT
Email the writer: tom.sullivan@himssmedia.com