The Labor and Delivery System Big Three: Integration, Customizability and Support

OREM, UT, September 27, 2010 (Press-News.org) Energy in the healthcare industry has increased significantly in the two years since the 2008 KLAS Labor and Delivery (L&D) report was published. ARRA and its accompanying incentives have brought more focus on clinician adoption and made integration more of a necessity than a preference in technology purchasing decisions.

The KLAS "Labor & Delivery 2010: Who's Evolving, Supporting, and Integrating?" report found that a vendor's ability to integrate L&D to the EMR, to tailor the system to the needs of the facility and to provide quality support are what set a solution apart from the rest of the pack.

"Integration was once merely included on a wish list for providers' Labor and Delivery systems, but providers are feeling an urgency to break the data barriers between L&D and other hospital systems," stated Steve VanWagenen, author of the report. While all vendors have made progress in interfaces to lab, pharmacy and other ancillary systems, these basic interfaces no longer satisfy most providers' needs. Providers want an L&D system that will exchange data directly with their core EMR. A majority of hospitals are planning to keep their L&D system for at least the next two years, but sixty-nine percent of those planning to replace their system are looking for an integrated solution.

Additionally, most hospitals would like to be able to customize their solution to their hospital's specific L&D needs. Each L&D system offers a different level of customizability, but system flexibility can be both a blessing and a curse. Designing and supporting a highly customizable system requires significant time, ongoing IT support and often additional costs. Out-of-the-box solutions offer a simpler approach that can be implemented and maintained more easily with fewer IT resources, but they also offer less flexibility in adapting the system to the department's needs once users become more familiar with the system.

Even though each vendor offers a unique set of functionality strengths and weaknesses, most L&D solutions are fairly comparable when it comes to central surveillance, alerts, fetal strip archiving and retrieval. Support and proactive service often become differentiators in overall performance scores when product offerings are similar. When support is strong, providers tend to forgive minor system problems or issues. On the other hand, poor support can end up partially overshadowing product strengths. Until a solution distinguishes itself in either functionality or integration, quality of support will continue to be a primary factor in determining overall customer satisfaction.

In cooperation with the Association of Women's Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses (AWHONN), KLAS sought to understand how recent changes in the industry have affected the market for L&D systems. More than 250 organizations shared their insight about the L&D market and their experiences with L&D system vendor performance in the "Labor & Deliver 2010: Who's Evolving, Supporting, and Integrating?" report. CCSI OBIX Perinatal Data System was the highest ranked L&D system with an overall score of 87.7 out of 100. Hill-Rom NaviCare WatchChild (82.4) and GE Centricity Perinatal (81.3) were the second and third ranked solutions, respectively. McKesson Horizon Perinatal Care and Philips OB TraceVue were also ranked in the report. Preliminary performance data was included for CliniComp Essentris Perinatal and PeriGen PeriCALM Tracings, along with a brief update on Epic Stork and Cerner Millennium PowerChart Maternity.

To learn more about the labor and delivery market, as well as the strengths and weaknesses of participating vendors, the "Labor & Delivery 2010: Who's Evolving, Supporting, and Integrating?" report is available to healthcare providers online for a significant discount off the standard retail price. To purchase the full report, healthcare providers and vendors can visit www.KLASresearch.com/reports.

KLAS is an independent research firm specializing in monitoring and reporting the performance of healthcare vendors. KLAS' mission is to improve delivery, by independently measuring vendor performance for the benefit of our healthcare provider partners, consultants, investors and vendors. Working together with executives from more than 4,500 hospitals and over 2,500 clinics, KLAS delivers timely reports, trends and statistics, which provide a solid overview of vendor performance in the industry. KLAS measures the performance of software, professional services and medical equipment vendors. For more information, go to www.KLASresearch.com, email marketing@KLASresearch.com or call 1-800-920-4109 to speak with a KLAS representative.