[bigchewy]

Hi, I'm a 3 time healthcare entrepreneur (10 years) who has been down this path, and many like it, several times already. The problem you are describing is well known and in your hospital's IT queue, just so low on the list to be invisible.

As others have rightly pointed out, the technical issues are perhaps 10% of the problem. On top of that, because each EHR is configured so differently, your solution will be a consulting effort not a product (read: expensive)

My suggestion - thoroughly evaluate how difficult this would be to get approval for at your hospital. If you get past this stage, talk to other hospitals. Learn what the implementation process will be at each hospital. This will likely dissuade you but, if not, you've found a niche.

The reality is that this is not an IT problem but a process flow problem. Somebody with a lower pay grade should be entering this data, say an MA or a 1st year resident, until the IT team can prioritize this known issue.

[thetylerhayes]

Agreed.

What this means is that usually in the medical world you can't just build a product or service and sell it to EHR/EMR providers. Their (e.g., Epic, eClinicalWeb) customer is hospitals and clinics. So you need to get hospitals and clinics to demand/buy what you offer. Only then EMRs will pay attention and only because increasing amounts of their customers are knocking down their door asking for your product.

Very rare is the case where an EMR will see the market opportunity you're carving out and buy your product. They don't care. They'll either buy your company once you get big enough to represent a sizable addition to their revenue (single millions is not even close) or just build an imitation feature once they're forced to.