EHR Outages Will Cost You

By Katie Wike, contributing writer

EHR technology often simplifies and accelerates processes in healthcare organizations, but if the system fails, will you be left high and dry?

Unscheduled downtime of an EHR system can cause havoc for providers and frustrate patients, as Health IT Outcomes reported. A hospital in Northern California experienced such an outage of their system when a heating and air conditioning unit at the facility burned out, resulting in nearly a week of downtime.

A week may seem like an extreme period of time for a system such as their McKesson Paragon EHR to be offline, but as an article for Becker’s Hospital Review notes, Boston Children’s Hospital also experienced a six-day shortage last year. Fortunately, the hospital had a contingency plan in place. Additionally, California’s Antelope Valley Hospital experienced a three-day outage due to connectivity and data storage malfunctions.

One thing to remember is that outages can happen to any organization. If they do occur, they can cost you. Trisha Swift, DNP, RN, CPHQ, CPPS, Managing Partner of MeritLinkx Healthcare Consulting says hospitals need to be highly reliable, especially when it comes to their EHR systems.

In an upcoming webinar, Swift will present a case study, outlining the hazards of unscheduled downtime for a large integrated healthcare system. Such outages cost organizations more than just time, including:

• communication
• admissions and patient lists
• sequenced lab orders
• MAR documentation

To register for the webinar and learn more about the potential fallout of EHR system failure, click here.