Ever wonder why one EMR vendor charges $10+K and takes 1 year to implement a Lab-to-EMR interface and another EMR vendor charges $3K and takes 3 months?  You aren’t alone.  This is a common question in our industry.  With that said, everyone acknowledges the benefits of interfacing.  As mentioned in a previous post, pathology groups are eager to service the needs of their referring physicians.  Many times, though, it comes down to…yes, you guessed…TIME and MONEY.

So, what are some alternatives to Lab-to-EMR interfaces? Here is a quick list…

1.  Secure on-line access to lab reports– this service can be made available almost immediately in lieu of a results only interface or simultaneously while the interface is being built.  In some cases, if the EMR can support, uploading the lab report PDFs into the EMR may be a good solution.

2. On-Demand Faxing – Yes, there is still a lot of faxing going on, but the solutions are more automated, flexible and can be managed online.  Providing this as one of the methods within a multi-channel delivery strategy may fill the bill for practices.

3.  On-line Order Entry – To move the entire lab order/result process away from paper in the very short term, pathology groups can provide their referring physicians secure, web-based order entry.   In many cases, demographic data can be pulled from within the physician’s practice to make the ordering process very efficient and decrease data entry errors.

We are certainly not suggesting that pathology groups stop building EMR interfaces – because Pathagility actually provides this technology/service 🙂 – but for those groups that are struggling with Money and Time there are some alternatives that many physician groups can benefit from quickly.