When it comes to systems communicating, that’s known as ‘interfacing’. Most use what’s called a ‘HL7’ protocol or language(I never got into that much). That’s a standard that vendors use to enable their software to communicate with other vendor’s systems/databases. Building and purchasing interfaces can be VERY expensive. Hospitals that have multiple non integrated systems often have an interface person in house to handle it all.
It sounds like from your post that different Epic VERSIONS don’t communicate, and that’s HORRIBLE!!!! They should insure backward compatibility when they make changes. It’s all a money racket really. Pay them to upgrade, or pay MORE to stay with your current version, because you’ll need to buy an interface from us. (they figuratively have a gun to their heads at that point)
Actually, versions of Epic are backward compatible. You have to go through a testing period, of course, and there will be issues that need to be fixed, but they are backward compatible. We're in the process of upgrading to the latest version now. It's a process, and there's work to do, but that's with any vendor.
I think the problem the other poster was referring to is that if one hospital is on one version of Epic it may have difficulty communicating with another hospital that's on another version of Epic. That's where Care Everywhere comes in.
It’s all a money racket really. Pay them to upgrade, or pay MORE to stay with your current version, because you’ll need to buy an interface from us. (they figuratively have a gun to their heads at that point)
I'm not sure I completely agree with you here, except for the part about the gun pointed at the customers' heads. Physicians and nurses are very demanding, and they always want new features. They drive the upgrade process. They DEMAND the EMR vendor create new capabilities. Well that costs money to do. You can't fault the vendor for meeting their customers' demands and charging them for it. It's incredibly expensive to add new features to a software package like Epic, and they have a right to make a profit from their investment of time and money. It's only good business.