Common Challenges in Custom EHR Development and How to Overcome Them

The introduction of healthcare software solutions have given new hope to the healthcare industry in simplifying care practices and improving the quality of care. Especially with EHR software that has now become the epicenter of many if not all healthcare practices.

You see, almost all and 89% of healthcare practices adopted certified EHR systems, amongst which 48% of them use cloud-based EHR systems. As a healthcare professional, you know the importance of the EHR software system.

However, the widespread adoption gave rise to new challenges, such as the pre-existing EHR systems being unable to meet the demands of specialized healthcare practices. Finding a solution to this, many healthcare practices started to shift to EHR software development.

With custom electronic health records, they were not only able to address their unique clinical and administrative needs but also make it a one-stop solution for their healthcare practice.

Having said that, according to the Fox Group, almost 20% of the EHR installed at healthcare consulting firms can be considered a failure and more than 50% of the EHR systems aren’t used to their full potential.

Interestingly, a common link can be found in this is the inability of the practice to overcome the challenges that arise in EHR development. And if you’re looking for a customized EHR solution, then most likely you’re to face these challenges as well.

In this blog, let’s have a look at some of the major challenges of implementing custom EHR and how to overcome them.

Common Challenges in Custom EHR Development

Custom EHR development is a complicated process, and from clinical workflow to automating administrative tasks, everything needs to be considered, planned, and curated to achieve the desired results. So, if you’re looking for a custom EHR software solution for your practice, here are some of the most common challenges that you’re most likely to face.

1. Cost and Time

Unlike off-the-shelf EHR software solutions, custom EHR development is costly, as they need to be developed from scratch. That is why, during the development phase of the you first need to outline the financial investment for building your own EHR software.

While you’re determining the cost involved in developing a custom EHR, you also need to consider the time needed to develop the software. Since both cost and time run parallel to each other, a keen understanding of them must be taken into account.

One of the best strategies for optimizing custom EHR development costs involves phased implementation and using open-source solutions.

2. Technical Expertise

Remember, your custom EHR software will be majorly dealing with sensitive patient information and the aim of the software would be to help you in delivering quality care. Due to this you need to hire EHR developers who have an expertise in EHR development.

Skilled developers and healthcare IT professionals would help you in finding the right solution for your and also save significant time in the entire development process.

The best way to find a solution to this is to partner with an experienced healthcare software development company like Thinkitve. This is important because such EHR software development companies have experience in developing EHR software, and they can leverage the pre-built modules, which can further help you overcome EHR development challenges.

3. Interoperability

The healthcare industry is one of the most collaborative industries and every aspect of care delivery highly depends on each other. Bringing this collaboration to the digital healthcare landscape, your healthcare system must achieve interoperability to seamlessly exchange data with other disparate systems in real time. Some of the most prominent examples of such systems are pharmacies, labs, etc.

Interoperability is one of the major EHR implementation challenges that you are most likely to encounter. The best way to overcome this is by adhering to industry standards with HL7 FHIR and robust APIs.

4. Data Security and Privacy

As healthcare providers, you will be dealing with very sensitive patient health information, failing to ensure its privacy, confidential and ethical use can compromise the fundamental rights of the individual. That is why robust security measures must be taken to protect sensitive patient health information and data.

Though HIPAA regulations compliance help you in seamlessly navigate through the legal landscape, security and data privacy is still a major EHR development challenge. Some of the best practices to improve data security and privacy is to implement data encryption, role-based access controls and HIPAA regulations compliance.

5. Workflow Disruptions

Every healthcare practice works in a specific way that is unique to them and works best for them. However, the major EHR implementation challenge that you’ll most likely face is workflow disruption. There is a high chance that custom EHR functionality and workflow can disrupt the clinical or administrative workflow to which your healthcare practice is already used.

This can lead to resistance to new systems and even impact the productivity of your healthcare staff and providers. However, the solution to this also lies within itself; by involving the end-users in the development, you can easily curate a workflow that aligns with your practice.

Along with this, you should also consider providing extensive hands-on training so that your end-users actually know how to effectively use the EHR software.

6. Vendor Management

It is most likely that you will not be developing your custom EHR software by yourself. While there are many vendors available in the market, choose the one who aligns with your vision and maintains good relations. Some of the stats suggest that ineffective communication with vendors leads to EHR development challenges.

The best way for vendor management is to maintain good relationships with clear communication, defined milestones and effective contract negotiations.

Overcoming EHR Development Challenges

Now that you are aware of the most common challenges that you’ll face in custom EHR development, here are some of the tried and tested ways that you can use to overcome these challenges easily. You can use these ways as guidelines for developing the code of conduct of custom EHR development.

1. Thorough Planning and Needs Assessment

Thorough planning is the best way to know the entire development process and the potential loopholes in it. However, one that you need to consider during planning is carefully defining your requirements, budget and setting clear timelines.

Conduct a comprehensive needs assessment to identify and understand the specific needs of your practice, and on the basis of that, you can set further processes in motion for EHR software development.

2. Agile Development Methodology

There are often chances that after careful planning there are some intricacies that you must have missed and want to add later. So rather than disrupting the entire planning, adopt agile EHR development methodology, which keeps the development process on track and you can make chances as per your evolving needs.

Also, taking continuous feedback and testing the software every once in a while can help you be on track and make all the necessary changes to ensure the software works the way it is supposed to.

3. User-Centric Design

The success or failure of an EHR software, or any healthcare software for that matter, lies in its ease of use. That is why many healthcare IT professionals suggest implementing user-centric EHR design. However, during this development, you need to work closely with your end-users to understand their needs and requirements.

Also, after designing, conduct thorough user testing and incorporate feedback to improve usability. After all, only if your users can easily use the software can they deliver better care and help your practice be profitable.

4. Data Migration and Integration

One of the major challenges of implementing custom EHR often hits hard when data migration and integration process kicks in. There are several complexities that can arise while migrating data from legacy systems to your new custom EHR. Though you can use integrating tools that are available in the market, it is still recommended to partner with data migration experts and utilize standardized data formats to avoid any further complications.

4. Ongoing Support and Maintenance

Last but not least, ongoing support and maintenance becomes vital once you launch the EHR system. As it becomes an integral part of your healthcare operations, it will often encounter certain bugs and complications like any software. Here, you need to ensure its continuous functionality, and fix any bugs or issues that might arise. Also, adapt to the changes in your processes or regulatory requirements.

Here the role of your EHR vendors plays a crucial role and it is suggested to partner with vendors who offer 24/7 customer support and have a track record of quick response times. This way, if any issues pop up, we can get them addressed promptly to avoid disruptions in our healthcare services.

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