Epic Systems Tops EHR Vendor Expectations During COVID-19

Epic Systems and MEDITECH both stood above the rest and exceeded expectations as EHR vendors throughout COVID-19, according to a recent KLAS report.

This report follows up on a similar one published in July 2020.

KLAS researchers asked 6,300 healthcare professionals to rate their health IT vendor’s reaction and support to the coronavirus on a nine-point scale. Seventy-five percent of respondents scored their respective health IT vendor an 8.0 or higher on overall response and support during COVID-19.

According to KLAS, vendors that received a high overall satisfaction rating in the 2021 Best in KLAS awards scored higher during the pandemic.

Epic maintained its lofty EHR client expectations from KLAS’ first edition of this report. Epic customers scored the vendor an 8.2 after scoring it an 8.1 previously.

“Epic customers report a myriad of ways in which the vendor has supported them throughout the crisis,” wrote KLAS. “Repeatedly, customers say that when they were struggling, Epic emphasized meeting critical needs over cost and contracting. Many software upgrades were quickly released to meet a plethora of customer requests.”

Next, MEDITECH scored an 8.0 and jumped Cerner as the second-highest rated EHR vendor from the first report.

MEDITECH customers reported the vendor’s response to COVID-19 was fast, on target with their needs, and extremely helpful. Customers especially appreciated how MEDITECH made development and code changes very quickly. Respondents said they hope they will continue to see this level of responsiveness from MEDITECH in the future regarding other needs.

After scoring an 8.0 on the first report, Cerner dropped behind MEDITECH and NextGen Healthcare on the subsequent report. Cerner respondents scored the vendor a 7.7 overall score.

athenahealth clients reported similar satisfaction as they did in the first edition. They rated the vendor a 7.5 this time around after a 7.4 in July 2020.

Allscripts’ customers remained underwhelmed with the EHR vendor’s efforts during COVID-19. Allscripts was the only major EHR vendor to score below a 7.0 on both surveys.

“While many Allscripts customers report the vendor made significant efforts to support them through the crisis, customers using the Paragon platform or one of Allscripts’ ambulatory solutions are more likely to feel they have been working with thinly stretched resources or doing too much on their own,” the respondents described to KLAS.

Although Epic topped EHR vendor-client expectations, Nuance led all health IT vendor expectations with an 8.3 overall score.

“Nuance was ready in a variety of ways to help customers, from supporting a mobile, work-from-home workforce, to offering some customers free licenses to meet surge needs,” KLAS wrote. “Nuance’s quality management customers rated their vendor a perfect 9.0 (based on limited data), citing their excellent work quickly adding COVID-19 quality measures.”

Health Catalyst customers praised the health information exchange platform vendor by scoring it an 8.1 overall.

“Health Catalyst has armed their customers with critical data and insights, including predictive dashboards, in the fight against COVID-19. Similar to other high performers, Health Catalyst was quick to be flexible and supportive with everything from costs to service,” KLAS described.

PerfectServe, 3M, GetWellNetwork, and symplr (API Healthcare) rounded out the remaining vendors that scored an 8.0 or above.

“3M responded well to COVID-19 in many ways, including updating codes for revenue cycle and making other updates to ensure the MModal platform performed well throughout the crisis,” wrote KLAS. “Customers report that 3M did an excellent job checking in often and doing anything that was asked.”

Ninety-eight other health IT software vendors rated 8.0 or higher for their COVID-19 response and 98 percent of services firms rated above 8.0 for their COVID-19 response, KLAS noted.