Deloitte Offering Outsourced EHR Management

The Deloitte consultancy is expanding its electronic health records services to providers. The company has long assisted organizations in EHR planning, design, build, testing, implementation and go-live support, among other services.

Now, it is offering some outsourcing services, with a focus on providers implementing EHRs from Epic Systems Corp. Mitch Morris, global health leader at Deloitte calls the service “co-sourcing” as clients and the vendor will remain responsible for certain duties in getting the EHR live, such as creating content for evidence based-medicine as one example.

But Deloitte is offering outsourced day-to-day operations of the EHR and may also manage ancillary systems, depending on the preferences of each client. The package of services further includes EHR and workflow optimization, clinical transformation, and data analysis and reporting services.

Catholic Health Initiatives served as the pilot for the new outsource service, called Evergreen. Clients can save up to 30 percent on EHR operating costs under the program, Morris says. Organizations can use certified Deloitte personnel in India or the United States, or a combination.

For mid-sized and smaller hospitals that have upfront capital constraints, Deloitte will finance the costs up-front with payments made over several years. The outsource program also could serve critical access hospitals, most likely if they are part of a delivery system. “We have to push the envelope and help some of the have-nots gain EHRs,” Morris says. “Where we draw the line I don’t know, we’ll just have to figure that out.”