Maybe if the large organizations that will realize a savings help out the smaller organizations with buying equipment or free training. The smaller ones will be more willing to try. The bigger orgs could also "lend" some equipment and the smaller ones could try out the HER in parallel with the paper.
Thanks Marc Aylesworth C3I Associates AFRL/IFSE Joint Battlespace Infosphere Team 525 Brooks Rd Rome, NY 13441-4505 Tel:315.330.2422 Fax:315.330.7009 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Gregory Woodhouse Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2005 1:22 AM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Hardhats-members] Computer World Editorial on Network Effect Very perceptive, in my opinion. I suspect that everyone here is so focused on getting a product out that questions of interoperability are not given much consideration. But it's surely true that people will shy away from using VistA if they feel that they are locked in to a particular platform or product, even if it is open source. === Gregory Woodhouse [EMAIL PROTECTED] "A practical man is a man who practices the errors of his forefathers. -- Benjamin Disraeli On Aug 30, 2005, at 4:30 PM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > I'd like to hear everyone's thoughts about > > http://www.computerworld.com/newsletter/0,4902,104195,0.html?nlid=AM > > Network Effect > Opinion by Frank Hayes > > AUGUST 29, 2005 (COMPUTERWORLD) - "I work for a hospital > management company > in the Midwest that works with 30 very small rural community > hospitals. Not > one of our hospitals is ready for electronic health records. They > are not > even close to giving up paper. I guarantee you there are more > hospitals that > do not have EHR than those that do." > This network manager who wrote to me is right. When I said a few > weeks back > [QuickLink 55837] that "hospitals have made the transition over the > past > decade" to EHR, I was wrong. True, many large health care > organizations have > put EHR in place. But the rest of the health care world has a big > challenge > ahead. > > Wait, check that: A better way to say it is that because many > doctors and > small hospitals aren't using EHR, everyone in health care faces a big > challenge. > > Why? It's the network effect. Remember Metcalfe's Law: The more > users who > can communicate with one another on a network, the more valuable > the network > is. > > Sure, EHR can save some money internally for each organization that > implements it. But the big value comes when lots of organizations can > exchange medical records efficiently. > > And the lack of widespread use of EHR actually adds cost for > organizations > that use it. Every time one of those small community hospitals sends a > patient to a big health care organization with actual paperwork, > that paper > has to be converted to electronic records. Then the EHR has to be > printed on > paper again for the patient's file when he goes back home. > > That means we can't treat EHR as a competitive advantage that we > keep for > ourselves. We have to spread it around as widely as possible. > Otherwise we > can't realize the biggest benefits -- including the largest cost > savings. > > That's not unique to EHR. For example, no company can get maximum > advantage > alone from RFID; everyone on the supply chain has to use it. And > Internet > retailing only works when all customers and suppliers use the same Web > protocols. > > But that's not the way we're used to thinking about IT's benefits. > And it's > not the way we usually sell new IT initiatives to top management. > It's one > thing to say, "We need to adopt this technology to get an advantage > over the > rest of our industry." It's quite another to argue, "We need to get > the rest > of our industry to adopt this technology so we can maximize our > benefit from > it." > > In the case of EHR, it's especially sticky: These are patients, not > products, so there's no chance of a Wal-Mart-style "adopt this or > we won't > buy from you" ultimatum. > > But big health care organizations still have a big interest in > getting small > hospitals, clinics and medical practices on board with EHR. It's > the only > way to get a big-time payback from their own EHR spending. > > Making that happen won't be easy. The costs of software, hardware, > implementation, training and running the systems aren't trivial. > Distributing less-expensive EHR software like Vista-Office is a > start, but > more will need to be done. > > For big health care players, will that mean contributing > improvements to the > Vista-Office software? Partnering with small hospitals to train IT and > medical staff? Donating equipment? Lobbying for the health care > equivalent > of the Rural Electrification Act? > > I don't know. But short of a real push, big health care > organizations won't > get the ROI they want from EHR. And as that network-manager reader > put it, > "those that do not have EHR will not be ready in the next few years > -- or > the next 10 years." > > Incidentally, in response to readers who asked where to find Vista- > Office > EHR and the open-source OpenVista, try the Vista-Office Web site > (www.vista-office.org) and WorldVista (www.worldvista.org). > OpenVista is > available now; Vista-Office EHR is still scheduled to be out this > month. > > Frank Hayes, Computerworld's senior news columnist, has covered IT > for more > than 20 years. Contact him at [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > > > ------------------------------------------------------- > SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference & EXPO > September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle > Practices > Agile & Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects & Teams * > Testing & QA > Security * Process Improvement & Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/ > bsce5sf > _______________________________________________ > Hardhats-members mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members > ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference & EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile & Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects & Teams * Testing & QA Security * Process Improvement & Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf _______________________________________________ Hardhats-members mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference & EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile & Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects & Teams * Testing & QA Security * Process Improvement & Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf _______________________________________________ Hardhats-members mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/hardhats-members
