Giving a patient medications in the ER, having them pop positive on a test, and then withholding further medications because…
Morning Headlines 7/9/18
University of Washington Medicine prepares to move to a single EHR in a 30-month, $180 million project.
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Politico surmises that never-ending government healthcare changes and resulting uncertainty, especially those driven by the Affordable Care Act, have been a boon for consultants.
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The White House suspends the Affordable Care Act’s risk adjustment payments, which without further action will drive more insurers from the market and increase premiums.
I thought UW Medicine was already basically a full Epic shop? This seems like non-news, although $180 million to fill in some gaps seems exorbitant.
$190M in benefits on a $180M project seems pretty convenient. How much staff are they cutting? Are these numbers real?
A big chunk of cost savings comes from eliminating several systems and interfaces. Don’t forget that it costs us a lot to maintain separate systems communicating with each other across their independent upgrades. Also, saving maintenance fees.
Don’t forget one independent assessment that was done showed no benefits after 10 years. If you don’t think part of new savings comes from staff you haven’t read the notes. We lost millions of dollars last year and staff reduction is the plan to fix the problem.
As a former CFO at a university medical center a ROI of $190m that requires a $180m investment is a ‘no-brainer’ …that is the people moving ahead with it have no brains!
Any project as large and complex as this has at least a 90% probability of being 20% (or more) over budget. Nor did I see a ‘contingency allowance’ in the budget which would allow for any mistakes.
Given that, I would need to see at least a 50% ROI before moving ahead. Good luck UW, you’ll need it.