SOURCE: SK & A Information Services, Inc.

 

IRVINE, CA--(Marketwire - April 6, 2009) - With the recently passed "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009" offering big incentives to physicians to adopt EMR systems in their offices, a new research survey released today by SK&A Information Services, Inc. reveals 67% of medical offices with four or more physicians do not currently use EMR software. The survey results point to substantial sales and marketing opportunities for healthcare information technology vendors and service providers.

The Act, which aims to boost the struggling U.S. economy, is also meant to drive EMR adoption in order to reduce medical mistakes, saving the country hundreds of millions of dollars annually. Starting in 2011, $19 billion in net incentives will be paid to physicians who are "meaningful" EMR users. The incentives come in the form of increased Medicare and Medicaid payments to be disbursed over a five-year period and are not to exceed $40,000 to $44,000 per provider. Physicians who fail to become meaningful EMR users by 2015 may be subject to penalties.

"The EMR legislation found in the Act will drive improvements in patient care by incentivizing physician offices to implement EMR solutions," said Dave Escalante, President and CEO of SK&A. "The impact of this adoption will create opportunities in many industries -- EMR/electronic health record solution providers, healthcare IT consultants, computer hardware and software companies, and telephone and cable service providers. SK&A has assumed the crucial role of identifying the physician offices that will most likely be implementing new EMR solutions over the next few years."

SK&A's new "Physician Office Usage of Electronic Medical Records Software Report," which is summarized and segmented by office size, practice size, 20 site specialties and patient volume, reveals valuable trends on future EMR adoption. For example:

--  In smaller practices with four to five physicians, 31.6% have EMR
    software.  On the contrary, in larger practices with 26-plus physicians,
    39.24% have EMR systems.
--  In practices with three exam rooms, 33.77% have EMR software, whereas
    in practices with more than 11 exam rooms, nearly half have EMR solutions.
--  In physician offices with volumes of one to 50 patients per day, 30.2%
    have EMR software.  On the opposing side, of large practices with daily
    patient volumes of over 100 patients, 39.2% have EMR systems.
    

"These findings are not surprising," Escalante said of the trends. "Groups with four or more doctors are run like businesses with established processes and standards, like EMR, to boost efficiency, increase productivity, and lower costs, all while helping to improve the type and amount of care provided to patients. Through the new legislation, many practices will be encouraged to develop new strategies to modernize their offices."

The report also highlights SK&A's top 20 physician specialty areas by acceptance percentages for EMR software adoption. The specialty areas with the highest adoption rates include anesthesiology, emergency medicine and internal medicine. Those areas with the lowest adoption rates include urology, psychiatry and plastic surgery.

Findings from SK&A's research support the 2008 estimates projected by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) for office-based physician EMR usage. Between April and August 2008, the organization sent a series of three surveys to 2,000 U.S. physician offices. Of the surveyed physicians, 38% reported using full or partial EMR systems. The NCHS estimate aligns with the results found in SK&A's survey of 54,177 offices. Both conclude that significantly more than half of physicians do not have EMR systems in place.

SK&A's report is an ongoing study of all U.S. physician offices. When completed in May 2009, the report will feature data and summarized market research from 225,000-plus physician offices representing more than 638,000 physicians. In addition, SK&A is able to identify the IT-purchasing decision makers at the practice- and group-headquarter level who would most likely be responsible for making the EMR-solution decisions.

Editor's Note: For a copy of the summary findings for publication, please contact Jack Schember, SK&A Director of Marketing, at 800-752-5478, ext. 1259.

About the SK&A Research Center

Based in Irvine, Calif., SK&A's research center is responsible for the acquisition, compilation, verification and maintenance of over two million healthcare contact records. SK&A's team of 60 research associates completes more than 6,000 interviews per business day, verifying names, specialties, titles, phone and fax numbers, patient volume, and physician affiliation with medical groups, health systems and hospitals. SK&A research associates also perform custom-research projects.

About SK&A Information Services, Inc.

Celebrating its 27th anniversary, SK&A researches and maintains contact and profiling information for over two million healthcare practitioners, including 800,000-plus prescribers. SK&A also offers the largest database of practitioner email addresses. SK&A's customers include many of America's most recognized healthcare and pharmaceutical institutions. Please visit www.skainfo.com for more information or www.skalivecounts.com for counts and ordering.