- MarissaBrand
- gordman
- mithunsarker
- Kim07
- Ralph Waldren
Free and Open Source Electronic Medical Records
Submitted by Taran on 12 May, 2004 - 17:17.
One of the main advances for medicine in the realm of computing has been the ability to keep medical records electronically; to allow for faster and more rapid transmission of information regarding a patient and hopefully increasing the quality of life of the patient. Pay attention; that patient might be you.
OpenEMR is a GPL'd version of such medical administrative software. I first read about it here, courtesy Willy Smith via email, and did some digging. Truth be told, I had actually planned to write a similar application. But Pennington Firm apparently beat me to the punch.
From the demonstration, it's apparent that some thought went into the application itself - and from the Features document (pdf), it's apparent that the software is customizable for different needs of medical administratia. Further, it's is free to download, use, and customize.
In a medical sense, this is very good news - especially for hospitals and medical offices throughout the world, most notably in the developing world.
In a business sense, this is a true Free Software/Open Source business model: They've shared the recipe, and are willing to cook it for you for a price.
Aside from that, there's a lot of interesting information related to this which is worth considering. Consider Handhelds for Doctors combined with OpenEMR. Maybe even a Simputer.
The tools are there. They are customizable. It's just a matter of integrating solutions for the users... who may be our own doctors.
I'd sure like to know what software my doctor is using to handle something as important as my medical record.
OpenEMR Consulting and Supports
Our OpenEMR project handled very professional by the
Advent Consulting
team.
They have very good technical knowledges and provide custom integration works. Our project had a Voice-over-IP integration with OpenEMR.
Thank you for the kind words
OpenEMR has had a significant amount of success since your article in May 2004. As of December 2004 there are at least eight companies on three continents offering services related to OpenEMR.
More important than companies offering services is the wide adoption of OpenEMR by medical clinics. Adopters of OpenEMR include a medical billing company using OpenEMR with over 100 medical clinics and 300 providers, a government for use by 500 users in its departments of health and a Florida medical claims processing company.
We are in negotiation with several clinic support companies to migrate their clients from Medical Manager or Misys to OpenEMR. These companies provide technical support for medical clinics and are responsible for managing the services related to Medical Manager or Misys. Surprisingly, the reason for choosing OpenEMR and open source is rarely related to cost. The typical reason is lack of needed functionality, and the ability to add that functionality within OpenEMR. Other reasons include a forced migration or companies seeking to offer services barred when using WebMD or Misys applications.
Some of the work that has happened since May 2004 includes significant modification to the calendar, adding of categories for appointments, improvements in billing, advanced document management and accounting management of patient bills and A/R.
Even with OpenEMR's improvement, there is still more to do. We continue to improve billing within OpenEMR for better management of supplemental medical claims and for easier management of those claims by payers. Payers in the USA, for example Medicare, allow you to submit EDI claims using ANSI X12 4010A Amended and to send supplemental claim information. Medicare will send this supplemental insurer information to the payer to pay their share of the patient's bill. We want to allow clinics using OpenEMR to submit one electronic claim, to be paid by all payers responsible for that claim.
Thank you again for your kind words concerning OpenEMR.
Sincerely,
Walt Pennington