SCHWARTZ HEALTHCARE-IT BLOG

The Wal-Mart of EMR

Recently the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative announced the winners of a $50 million EMR pilot funded by the Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation. Among the EMR vendors in the bake-off for the 180 medical group practice contracts: GE Healthcare, NextGen, Allscripts, eClinicalWorks. eClinicalWorks roasted the competition, garnering 170 of the 180 practices.

eHealth Collaborative chief Micky Tripathi says "that was somewhat unexpected" to the Boston Globe. But to those who follow the EMR market, it shouldn't be that surprising. eClinicalWorks beat out a host of larger EMR players. Why? I've heard competitors refer to eClinicalWorks as "the Wal-Mart of EMRs." This is a compliment, given the company's success in the small and medium practice group market. A regular Best in KLAS favorite, eClinicalWorks is cheap, easy to use, built natively on the Web, and strong on functionality without laboring under lots of bells and whistles. "Value," as Wal-Mart shoppers would say. And eClinicalWorks' independent customer Web site keeps the company honest and listening to their customers.

Do the EMR big boys have such responsiveness? Obviously those Massachusetts doctors didn't think so. These practices are for the most part small medical groups, who tend to follow each other like a herd and seek inexpensive, simple technology. Money wasn't an issue in this case, as BCBSMA financed the IT purchase. This make eClinicalWorks' victory all the more telling about its technology.

Sure, the contract value for eClinicalWorks' customers is much smaller than the Cerners and GEs of the world. The big dollars are still at the high end with hospitals (until, or if, Uncle Sam ramps up grants or tax breaks - see "Plight of the Small Doc" post), where the eClinicalWorks of the world rarely qualify. Nonetheless, the EMR vendor big boys should take heed of the lesson of Massachusetts.

Posted by Shawn Whalen on April 25, 2006 at 11:00 AM
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