Study Weighs MEDITECH V.6 Against Provider Expectations

Providers that use MEDITECH are asking, “Is v.6 ready?” A new report from Orem, Utah-based KLAS, titled MEDITECH V.6 2011: Expectations Meet Reality reviews the experience of 38 new v.6 clients to find out how ready v.6 is. MEDITECH is the largest hospital Electronic Medical Record market share of any healthcare software vendor. Hundreds more are considering v.6, its newest platform, to reach meaningful use in time for deadlines. However, some v.6 clients are canceling go lives mid-implementation and trialing competing products MEDITECH v.6 is live at over 50 sites with another 150 contracted. MEDITECH is traditionally popular as an affordable, stable option, despite being weaker with some clinical functions. MEDITECH touts v.6 as a new generation of healthcare technology that gives significantly enhanced usability while staying budget friendly. The KLAS report, however, points to a premature entry to market that has left providers to deal with buggy software and incomplete integration across modules, though not all providers said it was surprising. Colin Buckley, KLAS report author said in a statement that v.6 had some providers very frustrated, yet others who are perfectly satisfied. KLAS reports that though providers say v.6 is half-baked and more expensive than other MEDITECH options, it is still considered cheaper than competing vendor products and worth the pain to make it work for them. To find the report go to: www.KLASresearch.com/reports.