Review of Practice Fusion

I think I've played around enough with this free PM/EMR to give a little feedback now... Although I'm entirely paperless, my own existing EMR consists of nothing more than a blank page using Microsoft's OneNote software... Think of writing on a blank sheet of paper for every patient but mine happens to be digital!  My document management system is through Paperport. Given the minimal complexity of my system, I've found anything that takes more than 5 minutes of training and learning to be a headache and is not worth the time.  So being able to set up Practice Fusion in five minutes and start working with a sample patient right away was quite refreshing.

Even at the outset, I was surprised by the relative simplicity of the EMR... On the main menu there are only seven categories... Home, Schedule, Charts, Messages, Documents, Reports and Admin.  Almost everything is intuitive, especially after watching short video tutorials on each category that don't take more than a few minutes to watch each.

Scheduling patients is a snap, Messages is a secure in-house e-mail system, Documents area allows uploading of any document, image or attachment that can subsequently be attached to a patient's chart.
{jgquote}But what I was most interested in was the Chart EMR area... The simplicity here is quite astounding as well.  It's merely sections of SOAP.  After inputting a CC and optional vitals, each section in turn brings up a template area on the left hand side.  At first, all I saw was a blank slate, which would have been fine with me since that's how I work anyways... But upon further analysis, punching in the search area OPH brought up all kinds of existing templates that are eye exam related...{/jgquote}
Now how it works is particularly intriguing... Rather than having fields, it is all broken into pieces of pre-written text... For example, the left side will have in bold the phrase, "Glaucoma Suspect"  By clicking on the right arrow next to it, it immediately transfers into the black Subjective area on the right side which you can then edit, or better yet, just keep clicking on various template "catch phrases."  If you don't see one you like, you can even create a new one and save it!  Click on O to get to the Objective section and you'll get template text like "VA without correction" to transfer into the blank area on the right and you just keep clicking on whatever observations you've made... The interesting thing is that once you get the hang of it, it's much faster than having to write sentences!   I think the challenge is our refraction, K's and all the numerical data us ODs tend to have... I'm not sure how we can template that easily... And I don't think anything in the EMR can be integrated with instruments... That's part of why it's free, I guess.

Going on to Assessment allows you to search and pull up Dx codes by ICD-9 or by description.  Plan area includes templates for you to write meds dispensed and even allows instant printing of your written Rx.

The other amazing thing about this template system is if you bring back a patient for a followup visit, all previous visits are available as well in a template format!  So instead of writing the report from scratch, you click on whatever previous visit you want and just transfer any or all of whatever past visit templated pre-written text there may be into your new SOAP note.

As for billing, Practice Fusion has it's own integrated billing system that charges 6% of receipts that are received and deposited.  They don't get paid until you get paid... Pretty good incentive for them to do a good job if you ask me...

For conversion purposes, they have a partnership with Digital Island to convert all your paper charts into electronic charts.

I know this is getting long but I also know this is just the tip of the iceberg.  The good news is that it's simple enough where I can start using this with my first live patient tomorrow and feel confident it won't slow me down... And it didn't take a week of training to do it.  Everything seems self-explanatory and yet they have video tutorials, quick e-mail support and also optional one-hour training sessions you can sign up for.  It really is very impressive they can do all this for free.  Even the Google ads you see are quite non-intrusive although can be eliminated for a $100/month fee.

I have no doubt ECR is much more powerful and OD-centric.  But if you want a taste of a web-based EMR that's fully functional within five minutes and is free, go ahead and sign up and find out for yourself... You've got nothing to lose and you might learn something you either like or dislike that will help you narrow your EMR choices.  So far, I've never seen anything easier to learn, at least from the get-go.  Although I thought it might only be ideal for me since I have minimal needs, they now have over 2,000 physicians signed up and just implemented their EMR into one of Chicago's largest MD groups, a 200-doc practice.

Sign up to try it here... http://www.practicefusion.com/index.htm

In addition, here's a good blog post about scenarios of EHR data sharing among docs and how Practice Fusion theoretically handles it...
http://www.emrandhipaa.com/emr-and-hipaa/2009/01/06/ehr-data-sharing-example/

Finally, if you have some extra time, take 16 minutes out to watch this video interview of the CEO, Ryan Howard.  Though the video quality is not great, the interview is quite revealing... I think you'll like his business model and approach.  Hope my somewhat rambling post helps a little.  --DC http://www.viddler.com/explore/scobleizer/videos/6/

Dickson Chen, OD, FAAO
Pasadena, CA
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