Clicky

February 8, 2012

PWC study outlines the “carrot and stick” aspect of stimulus based EMR adoption

May 14, 2009 By 5 Comments
Million dollar highway [U.S. 550] is cut throu...
Image by The Library of Congress via Flickr

A report recently issued by the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) Health Research Institute concludes that government incentives intended to spur the use of health information technology are a “small carrot” when compared with the amount of money it will cost hospitals and physician practices to implement and maintain electronic health records, or EHRs, during the next five years.

The recently enacted American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, or ARRA, makes funds available to hospitals and physician practices that implement government-certified EHR systems between 2011 and 2015. According to the ARRA, the federal government will pay individual physicians as much as $44,000 to upgrade their practices from paper-based records to EHRs. 

However, the report “Rock and a Hard Place: An Analysis of the $36 Billion Impact From Health IT Stimulus Funding” estimates that a three-physician practice could spend anywhere from $173,750 to $296,000 for an EHR package complete with software, implementation, training and software maintenance. 

For the rest of this enlightening article and some great information on the “penalty phase” of the stimulus plan please see the AAFP.Org website here.

Filed Under: EHR, EMR, Hospital IT, Implementation Tagged With: , , ,
  • http://businessisart.wordpress.com/ Business Is Art

    “However, the report “Rock and a Hard Place: An Analysis of the $36 Billion Impact From Health IT Stimulus Funding” estimates that a three-physician practice could spend anywhere from $173,750 to $296,000 for an EHR package complete with software, implementation, training and software maintenance. ”

    Guess what? That average cost goes up much further when you wipe out half of the playing field because of CCHIT….and it was the half that kept the big vendors “honest” with their pricing. It seems to have a taken a few months, but a lot of people are now starting to realize the ramifications of what this legislation actually will mean/do…especially if we continue down the path of CCHIT being the only certification body.

  • http://businessisart.wordpress.com Business Is Art

    “However, the report “Rock and a Hard Place: An Analysis of the $36 Billion Impact From Health IT Stimulus Funding” estimates that a three-physician practice could spend anywhere from $173,750 to $296,000 for an EHR package complete with software, implementation, training and software maintenance. ”

    Guess what? That average cost goes up much further when you wipe out half of the playing field because of CCHIT….and it was the half that kept the big vendors “honest” with their pricing. It seems to have a taken a few months, but a lot of people are now starting to realize the ramifications of what this legislation actually will mean/do…especially if we continue down the path of CCHIT being the only certification body.

  • admin

    These numbers have got to be a bit shocking for small practices. They’re not big companies with sophisticated IT people schooled in figuring out the true cost of ownership for tools like these. If, as you suggest in your comment, the cost does increase as competition begins to fall away the situation gets even worse for the small practice. Converting to EMR should be a great long term investment for a small practice, if they choose wisely and implement well. The practices who keep that in mind have a much greater likelihood of satisfaction with their purchase decision.

  • admin

    These numbers have got to be a bit shocking for small practices. They’re not big companies with sophisticated IT people schooled in figuring out the true cost of ownership for tools like these. If, as you suggest in your comment, the cost does increase as competition begins to fall away the situation gets even worse for the small practice. Converting to EMR should be a great long term investment for a small practice, if they choose wisely and implement well. The practices who keep that in mind have a much greater likelihood of satisfaction with their purchase decision.

  • Pingback: Weighing the upfront costs of EHR vs the back end payout