Competition for GE: Wal-Mart??

Logos courtesy of http://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/

GE has assured us that the Centricity EHR will fulfil the yet-to-be determined certification requirements and qualify docs for incentives thereof. But wait. . . there might be a cheaper way to achieve the same goal!

The New York Times reports that Wal-Mart wants to be your EHR provider. Wal-Mart's Sam's Club will bundle Dell computers with eClinicalWorks software, as well as as installation, maintenance, and training. This package supposedly will cost as little as half of "rival health information technology suppliers". The bundle will cost under $25,000 for the first physician in a practice and $10,000 for each additional doc. Annual support will run $4,000 to $6,500.

eClinicalWorks is sold as a service over the 'Net, with little resident software on the local computer.

HIStalk Tim interviewed Girish Kumar from eClinicalWorks the other day, and he assured us that the product you might buy at Sam's is the same as what you might buy direct from eCW.

(P)eople will ask the question: if I’m able to get a comprehensive product that people are happy with at this price point with content and support, why should I spend more? Price visibility will be black and white. No longer will you see those quotes saying an EMR will cost $300,000. You will see more informed questions, pricing pressure, and frankly, higher expectations if content is provided. I don’t want to take six months to implement PM and another six months for an EMR. This is a unified product we’re offering, by the way, both EMR and PM. We’re offering five days of implementation on site with the Sam’s Club package and they can buy more for $750 a day plus travel, but our track record is that we can do it in five days.

I wonder how K-Mart and Family Dollar will compete with this. . .