Looking at EMR? Avoid NextGen

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So my group started EMR around 2 weeks ago. The heads of our group decided to go with NextGen after looking at a few systems. So far it's been a completely miserable experience. For a company that supposedly has worked with ophthalmic practices before, the system is totally user unfriendly and has so many quirks and flaws it's mind boggling. To boot the customer service is atrocious. Call for help with problems? You get the run around and get transfered to multiple departments and nobody can every answer your question!

Just thought I'd share this. Hopefully stop someone else from making a huge mistake.

NextGen is probably the most expensive system, for which you would get the worst bang for your buck. It completely lacks customizability, and can take weeks to months to create your ideal template, which can cost a pretty penny. Sorry to hear about your purchase. You could've gotten better EMR's for much less.

I remember calling for a price quote and they were very hush hush and ambiguous about it. Bad sign.

Originally Posted by intoxicatedtiger

NextGen is probably the most expensive system, for which you would get the worst bang for your buck. It completely lacks customizability, and can take weeks to months to create your ideal template, which can cost a pretty penny. Sorry to hear about your purchase. You could've gotten better EMR's for much less.

I remember calling for a price quote and they were very hush hush and ambiguous about it. Bad sign.

Yep agree with everything you said. Unfortunately the doctors in my group (I'm just an employee right now, not a partner and don't get to decide anything) chose poorly. One of the many examples why I'm starting to look for another job!

I've heard similar things about NextGen. Very expensive. They'll tell you that they have staying power, as they're big and have been in the business for years, compared to many of the smaller companies that popped up after the EHR mandate. That's great, but there's more to it than that. We adopted EHR about a year ago. We were down to NextGen and Compulink. When the NextGen rep came in to demonstrate, she kept getting error messages popping up. Seemed like she didn't know what she was doing. We thought, there's no way we'll be able to teach our staff how to use this, if she can't use it! Compulink was smooth as silk in the demo. It was also much cheaper and had eye-specific templates that we were able to modify. NextGen gives you a blank slate that you have to adapt to your uses. Can be very overwhelming. There's enough stress with the process. You don't want more! There have been plenty of bumps in the road, mind you, but we're happy with Compulink.

After using NextGen for 4 weeks now I really wonder if any doctors at all were involved in designing this system. It's so user unfriendly and inefficient I sometimes really want to pick up the computer monitor and chuck it out the window.

I was lucky that during residency we had Epic. I really didn't like it when I first started using it, but then, I learned how to create "dot phrases" and it made things much easier. Sending consults became a snap.

Epic is really $$$ and it unfortunate that most practices can't take advantage of this integrated product.

I think an EMR discussion can be helpful. Any other success or failures with EMR's? I am charged with investigating them as the newest partner and most tech savvy (which isn't saying much). I looked at NextGen and didn't like the interface. Seemed very click heavy (therefore time wasting). Also looked at ifa and liked it ok. Wonder about the conversion of German/European management, coding, etc and the ever changing and stringent US govt requirements. It's about as expensive as Medflow (read: very), but Medflow seems a bit busy on the screen. I guess you get used to that aspect and Medflow has been around for a while and are very big. We looked at Compulink and it seems ok considering the relatively lower cost. Wondering if anyone has experience with OIS/Merge or SRSoft? At the end of the day, you get all of these in-house or virtual demos and a lot run together and it gets hard to truly compare systems. I have definitely eliminated some based on demos and Academy booth presentations, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of independent reviews or info out there that I know of. Any opinions?

Originally Posted by OMD

I think an EMR discussion can be helpful. Any other success or failures with EMR's? I am charged with investigating them as the newest partner and most tech savvy (which isn't saying much). I looked at NextGen and didn't like the interface. Seemed very click heavy (therefore time wasting). Also looked at ifa and liked it ok. Wonder about the conversion of German/European management, coding, etc and the ever changing and stringent US govt requirements. It's about as expensive as Medflow (read: very), but Medflow seems a bit busy on the screen. I guess you get used to that aspect and Medflow has been around for a while and are very big. We looked at Compulink and it seems ok considering the relatively lower cost. Wondering if anyone has experience with OIS/Merge or SRSoft? At the end of the day, you get all of these in-house or virtual demos and a lot run together and it gets hard to truly compare systems. I have definitely eliminated some based on demos and Academy booth presentations, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of independent reviews or info out there that I know of. Any opinions?

As I detailed above, we've had a pretty good experience with Compulink. There have been bumps in the road, but overall it's good, especially for the price. Our managing partner is now on the advisory board, trying to help them improve certain aspects. It's very customizable and they've been very receptive to suggestions.

Fact is that most systems will be click heavy (unless you prefer hotkeys, which I don't). We actually invested in touch screens, hoping to utilize that type of interface over mouse clicks. Was too difficult. We were having a lot of fat fingered errors in entry. Everyone is pretty much mouse, except the front office folks who were used to hotkeys from our prior PM system.

I've heard good things about MedFlow, but it is pretty expensive. Not familiar with OIS/Merge. My understanding about SRSoft is that it's a hybrid system with a lot of scanning of documents, rather than data entry. Makes it faster, but I suspect it will be problematic with meaningful use.

What you need to understand is all of these systems are a major adjustment. You can only adapt the systems to a degree. It's more on you to adapt yourself to the system. Once you've been doing paper charts for years, it's a shock to switch, but it's doable. I recommend slow implementation. Start with the PM, then new patients only (should only be 7-10 per day for most docs). That will give the techs/staff time to get used to the system. Finally, gradually introduce established patients in groups (e.g., last name A-C). Also, it's okay to hold onto the paper charts as a safety blanket, until you have your established patients firmly in the system. It's too difficult to review scanned charts in the system. Using this approach, we experienced very little slowdown in patient volume.

If you want more info, PM me, and I'd be happy to discuss it with you.

I have used Epic, VersaSuite, Medinotes and will be using Mediflow in a year.

IMHO, Epic is a great EMR. No one can match in in customization, stability and support. Unfortunately, it is not available to private practices and small institutions just yet.

VersaSuite- worst EMR I have ever seen and used. Completely unstable, very poor customer support, lack of customization, not user friendly. Stay away.

Medinotes- that's what our practice is currently using. I like it a lot. Your note is on one page (unlike VersaSuite). Stable. Good customer support. At present, we customized it enough that all our techs, front staff and MDs like it. Unfortunately, it is going away for us.

Mediflow- our whole organization signed up to switch to AllScripts within the next year. AllScripts had acquired Mediflow as it's ophthalmology unit. I am getting mixed reviews with it (there is a big group in San Diego that hates it and had to go to scanned notes to be able to somehow adapt to it). We shall see.

Originally Posted by Visionary

As I detailed above, we've had a pretty good experience with Compulink. There have been bumps in the road, but overall it's good, especially for the price. Our managing partner is now on the advisory board, trying to help them improve certain aspects. It's very customizable and they've been very receptive to suggestions.

Fact is that most systems will be click heavy (unless you prefer hotkeys, which I don't). We actually invested in touch screens, hoping to utilize that type of interface over mouse clicks. Was too difficult. We were having a lot of fat fingered errors in entry. Everyone is pretty much mouse, except the front office folks who were used to hotkeys from our prior PM system.

I've heard good things about MedFlow, but it is pretty expensive. Not familiar with OIS/Merge. My understanding about SRSoft is that it's a hybrid system with a lot of scanning of documents, rather than data entry. Makes it faster, but I suspect it will be problematic with meaningful use.

What you need to understand is all of these systems are a major adjustment. You can only adapt the systems to a degree. It's more on you to adapt yourself to the system. Once you've been doing paper charts for years, it's a shock to switch, but it's doable. I recommend slow implementation. Start with the PM, then new patients only (should only be 7-10 per day for most docs). That will give the techs/staff time to get used to the system. Finally, gradually introduce established patients in groups (e.g., last name A-C). Also, it's okay to hold onto the paper charts as a safety blanket, until you have your established patients firmly in the system. It's too difficult to review scanned charts in the system. Using this approach, we experienced very little slowdown in patient volume.

If you want more info, PM me, and I'd be happy to discuss it with you.

Hello.
I work for a medical software company, and as I had to search for information about Ophthalmology EMR, I thought I could share some interesting resources:

- an ophthalmologist blog with asection dedicated to EMR
- a"review" of Advanced Data Systems by an independent ophthalmologist
- an "almost objective" article aboutEMR basic features (a bit old maybe...)
- this article seems more objective and offers anoverview of several EMR systems

And if you have to discuss EMRs, I think one important aspect would be to discuss the cloud/non-cloud issue.
This article could give a good starting point.

Has anyone tried Nextech?

My office is considering the Officemate program/ExamWriter EMR. It is widely used by optometrists as it supposedly links real well to an optical shop, which we do have. Was curious if anyone had any experience with this software. Any info appreciated. Thanks

Consider a cost-effective, open source alternative: http://www.oemr.org/

I use it in my office.

If you need help, send me a message.

I too have heard of people having trouble with NextGen. The wrong EMR can really cause a lot of trouble for an office. So far, I have been lucky with my EMR - IO practiceware. They are ophthalmology-only, use touch-screens (making it easy for staff members who cannot type), and readily available to help with any bumps along the way. Also, I am happy because I just received my first government incentive check!

Originally Posted by bucknut101

After using NextGen for 4 weeks now I really wonder if any doctors at all were involved in designing this system. It's so user unfriendly and inefficient I sometimes really want to pick up the computer monitor and chuck it out the window.

We had to use NextGen for our FM residency clinic. It was absolutely awful. The fastest person still needed about 2 months to learn how to sort-of, kind-of use it. Some residents never got the hang of it before they graduated.

The upside is, once you've used NextGen, learning any other EMR on the market is a breeze by comparison. Small consolation, I know.

Got to this thread a little late (first post). My practice is currently searching for a system. Has anyone heard of IO Practiceware?