News 10/4/11

From Savvy Shopper: “Re: KLAS ratings. In a quick check of KLAS ratings for some of the top EMR vendors, I was surprised to see athenaclinicals and Greenway PrimeSuite significantly ahead of the likes of eClinicalWorks, Allscripts MyWay, and NextGen.” I have to admit I find the KLAS ratings fascinating to read, especially the user comments. It’s fun to learn what makes users fall in love with their vendors, as well as read details of their dirty laundry. In my vendor days, we always encouraged our happiest clients to rate us and crossed our fingers that those impossible-to-please types would not find the KLAS Web site. Though I know most vendors probably have similar strategies, in the end KLAS seems to do a pretty good job of capturing  both the good and the bad. Congrats to athena and Greenway for a strong showing.

eClinicalWorks President Girish Kumar Navani welcomes 2,700 customers to his company’s annual National Users Conference in Scottsdale. The event includes 140 educational sessions, as well as some dancing Monday night (those are the pics I want to see.) eCW announced several new clients, including Florida State University’s Student Health Services, the 165-provider Women’s Care Florida, and the 12-location Denver Nephrology.

Greenway Medical, which recently filed for a $100 million IPO, expects to add 400 jobs over the next three years at its Carrollton, GA headquarters. According to state officials, the company will also undertake a $12 million expansion and take advantage of $7.55 million in state job tax credits and a $126,000 break in sales and use tax.

Praxis aligns with CollaborateMD as a preferred EMR/EHR partner and will offer CollaborateMD’s PM software integrated with Praxis EMR. CollaborativeMD clients will also be eligible for special pricing on Praxis EMR.

Clearwave Corporation, a provider of patient information exchange software, partners with Zepherella to offer Clearwave customers access to Zepherella’s PatientPay online payment service.

Four out of five physicians use smart phones, tablets, and medical apps to practice medicine, with ER docs the most likely to use to use digital technology. Cardiologists, urologists, and nephrologists are the next biggest techies.

RCM provider Navicure announces that by the end of October, it will be sending claims to all Medicare payers in the HIPAA Version 5010 format. The company will also continue to accept 4010-formatted claims beyond the January 1, 2012 deadline.

The American Academy of Ophthalmology partners with Sophrona Solutions to provide eye care practices access to the Academy’s patient-education materials through Sophrona’s Web-based patient-communication patient portal.

Covisint announces that it is accepting PQRS submissions through its Covisint DocSite service. For 2011, CMS is paying eligible providers a financial incentive of 1% of their total allowed charges for care provided to Medicare Part B fee-for-service patients.

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