HIStalk Quotes
From HIMSS 02/28/07
From Unapologetic: "Re: HIMSS. VasTech - handing out loaded margaritas all day long." Thanks for reminding me of their name. I had one of their little frozen and allegedly alcohol-containing 'ritas Monday from their tiki hut booth and it was good, so I wanted to give them a plug but then forgot the name. VasTech. They do staff scheduling and are getting into time and attendance, the guy told me. It gets too darn sticky hot in the displays, especially in the morning before the AC kicks on and catches up, so I needed that cool-down (and then I froze in some of the sessions - the Dave Garets one must have been about 35 degrees.)
From JustLeftHIMSS: "Re: GE's slipping. Rumor is that they will not have a new patient monitor for two more years and PMS is eating their lunch. Cardiology's slipping due to wonder about DICOM (Cerner). Their stock has languished at ~$35 for >5 yrs. No amount of acquisitions will make up for coherent new product releases."
Looks like the HIMSS conference is about over. I've had a pretty good time but I'm glad to be heading home tomorrow. My feet are blistered, I need food that's healthier and more predictable in its arrival, and I want to sleep in a bed with another human.
I spent most of the day in the exhibit hall today, but mostly wandering around aimlessly. About the only wisdom I can impart involves what I would consider to be the coolest software I've seen this week: RemedyMD. Nothing on their site or in their small booth does it justice - you have to see the demo. It's an application builder, analytical tool, interface, clinical application, research application, and who knows what else, all wrapped up in an ultra-slick package written in PHP, AJAX, .NET, Oracle, and with a very cool user interface. I can't really explain it, so all I can say is if they're still around tomorrow, you've got from 10:30 until 1:00 to get a look. Geeks will salivate.
Someone asked me to check out the QuadraMed booth. Looked OK. Nothing stood out there, but there was certainly nothing wrong with it. I used to know a few of their folks, but most have left. That's true of most vendors, now that I think of it. Seems like lots of folks changed employers in the last 3-4 years.
Someone whose name you'd recognize instantly asked me what the "theme" was of this conference (actually, two people at that level asked the question, and oddly enough, I'd asked it of someone else myself.) I think we all concluded that there wasn't one. The biggest surprise to me was IHE (very well done). No one vendor dominated, no big announcements were made that I recall, and there was no must-see presentation. I'm not sure if it was boring or just had a new emphasis on reality instead of fakery.
Reflecting back on the overall conference, which vendors made the best impression? Here are my thoughts:
- Intel. The C5 handheld was cool - I got to screw around with one today. It seemed easy to hold and use and had a great display, although with a three-hour battery life, it may spend most of its time tethered out there in the real world. I see that Philips pre-announced their connection with Intel to build something that sounded pretty much like the C5.
- Allscripts. CTO Stanley Crane is a very smart guy and their new Universal Application Integrator strategy has all kinds of strategic implications that few would understand. I may need to interview him here. They have big plans that are almost viral in nature. They're also getting tons of PR for all kinds of stuff.
- athenahealth. Well, you're probably sick of my uncharacteristic Jonathan Bush fanboy gushing, so I'll leave it at that.
- Picis. Sometimes you get to watch a big player arrive. I think we're seeing that with Picis.
- eClinicalWorks. They just got another huge deal, a 1300-doc practice. You do not want to compete with them on price, reference sites, or salesmanship.
- Epic. Judy was funny in the Dave Garets thing and was having fun in the booth. I was neutral on everything else about the company at the conference, but she was fun.
- Medicity. I know they sponsor, but they've really pushed into the mainstream and gotten value from the Park City Solutions acquisition.
I noticed that a new HIMSS Analytics press release says they're a nonprofit subsidiary of HIMSS. I was sure they were originally a for-profit (since I'd ripped them for it) and, sure enough, when I checked their cached website, they were indeed originally for-profit. I saw no announcements. Wonder when and why the change?
Come on down, Jonathan Sherman of Dearborn Advisors! Proudly wearing the "I Am Mr. HIStalk" button and caught in the act. That's the only one I noticed today, but I'm happy that it wasn't none. It looked like a smaller stack at the Picis booth, so I was hoping some had been worn.
I checked February stats and they were just short of the record set in November when all the Kaiser hubbub was happening. For this shorter 28-day month, 130,792 total hits. Projected: 69,123 page views a month, 46,107 visits. I've got some cool ideas to expand HIStalk, but of course the part I can't expand is the time I have available to do it. A couple of pretty big names have urged me to do it full-time and suggested ways to make it work financially. I'm just flattered that a blog no one was reading not long ago now not only makes some money, but could even be mentioned in the same breath as full-time job. I'd have to get some of that Halamkawear black attire so I could pull off the hipster thing.
New text ad to your right. Please check it out and give them a look.
Either a bunch of people must have checked out of the hotel already or they're all out carousing - the wireless connection is much better tonight, screaming fast in fact, the best since Saturday.
Someone had hot beignets at their booth today. Very good and much appreciated. They also had cafe au lait, but I'm a soda man myself.
Children's Boston picks Encentuate for SSO.
Medsphere gets a new client in Wyoming. They also announce the release of source code for OpenVista in community versions, freely downloadable from SourceForge. I don't know if this is enough to keep the open source guys happy, but as I've said before, who cares? The code is Medsphere's to use strings-free, courtesy of Uncle Sam. A hospital chooses it because it works, it's proven, and it's cheap, not because they have strong altruistic opinions about the open source community and are aware of the fine points of GPL vs. FOSS and all that stuff. If I were Medsphere, I'd drop the whole "open" part of the branding and also drop the lawsuit against the Shreeves. Its good enough to be an inexpensive vendor of a product that works. Where you got your code is your own business.
Travel home safely. Now that you've seen New Orleans first-hand, spread the word that it's fun again since they really need the tourism. And if you want to write a guest article (a vendor view on the cost of exhibiting would be cool since we haven't had that for awhile) or have an interview idea or whatever: e-mail me.
rumor re:Cerner -- Paul Black is on the ropes, and a dead man walking.
Good chunk of manageMENt are off to greener patches over the septic tank
(oh, darn). Letter went out saying that anyone not a "virtual sales rep"
HAS to move to KC - and the thought is that Cern is trying to mimic the
cabin-in-the-woods Judyland. They recently bought a ton of space in KC,
and look to bring the troops in for bbq and late night pizza parties (or to
boost ticket sales at Neal's new soccer team's home games). As for your
buttons, you're not looking hard enough, or you're not getting your
mile-walk in...I saw four (I'm wearing one) today alone. Don't give
up...you are definitely button-worthy.
I have a graduate student, Christa Bartos, RN MSIS, MS Biomedical
Informatics who is very interested in identifying a few more hospitals for
her dissertation study on "Perception of Personal Power and Their
Relationship to Clinician's Resistance to the Introduction of Computerized
Physician Order Entry (CPOE)".
Would anyone take exception to her "recruiting" a few more interested
hospitals who are implementing CPOE here on HISTalk?
The cool thing about her study is that she will provide the
aggregated/annonymized data back to the sites that participate and as a
kicker, I will pay her way to present the work at your site after she
completes the study.
Is HISTalk OK with her posting her study invitation?
As an new HISTalker (and since this is my first post) I thought I should
ask.
E-mail me directly or call my cell (below) if you want to discuss
this.
Mike Becich
Chairman, Biomedical Informatics
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
becich@pitt.edu or cell - 412-606-6453
The OnBase Sports bar, I mean booth. Friendly to hospitals and vendors
alike. Thanks! Also, my thanks to a number of vendors for the 'eye
candy'. Personally, I don't know how they do it when it is so blatantly
sexist, but I'm not complaining. The magician at Cisco was a hit too.
re: Saw a small booth - Mobile MD and Unapologetic's question, MobileMD is
very real and must be taken very seriously; according to the Colorado docs
on our reference checks, they are the one to watch. These guys have
created a full service offering that solves the last mile problem: results
directly into the docs' aEMR sandbox. The practice managers givde rave
reviews. the only concern noted is will they be able to keep up their high
service level as they expand nationwide; big demand for them right now.
Early indication is yes but must be part of due diligence.
Thanks for the parting comments from HIMSS Mr. HISTalk. I had to put in a
quick note of agreement to GoHeels comments referring to a healthy balance
between male and female eye-candy. After all, if I can be mesmerized by
NextGen's Robert Palmer Girls, then by golly, it's time to rollout the male
beefcake in full force next year. Heck, maybe we can get JB to sport just
a loin cloth..just for Mr. HISTalk. On a serious note, I left HIMSS again
thinking there is way too much technology and gizmos chasing too few
dollars. I was impressed with all the creativity and pizazz, just
wondering how much of it both large and small will be around in another 5
years. I also felt the people of New Orleans were very nice and welcoming.
Is anyone familiar with the eRx initiative, which provides electronic
prescribing to all providers at no cost? Is there a catch? Is Allscript
planning to sell the aggregate prescribing data? Is anyone using the
system, and are they pleased with it?
John
Methodist Healthcare in Memphis recently implemented Imprivata OneSign
The reason you didn't see many HIStalk buttons this year is over the past
12 months you have become a sell out only giving high marks to vendors who
sponsor HIStalk. It was a much better read prior to you falling in love
with your sponsors. I went by many of the boths you gave A's to and talk
with other's and do not agree with your rankings. If Cerner gave you
sponsor money next month would you fall in love with them too. Go back 12
- 18 months and talk about all vendors without having basis towards $$$.
Sell Out, what are you a disgruntled Cernerite? Ticked because Neal got
the Pie again? The crux of your argument seems to be that you personally
disagree with Mr HISTalk's rankings, so yaaaaaaawn.
Re: Robert Frank comments on eRx / NESPI / Allscripts - Small practice
vendors are in for a rough road. Changes in the regulations favor
hospitals pushing their solution at 15% of cost out to the small practice
physician - this will favor the big vendors like Siemens, Epic, Eclipsys,
etc. who offer hospitals a solution that can be shared out to the
affiliated practices without the need for complex interfaces. Practice
Partner just sold to McKesson (customer buzz is that they feel safe - their
vendor has a safe landing zone and their chosen product will survive).
Allscripts faces tough new challenges from GE - pushing Logician now where
Allscripts used to be the default choice. Allscripts is still a good
product, but so was Sony BetaMax. They've had a good run, but I'd expect
tough times ahead.
