The PDA revolution in Health Care. : How goes the war?
While 25% of physicians carry PDAs, market share by even the largest health care PDA-platform is still in the single digits of percentage.
By on May 2, 2001While 25% of physicians carry PDAs, market share by even the largest health care PDA-platform is still in the single digits of percentage. The panel began with what features will drive adoption of PDAs? Richard Altinger, Vice President, Corporate Development of ePhysician listed: (1) ease of use, (2) provision of information desired by physicians for the clinical environment, (3) integration of the PDA with the physician's practice management system, and (4) connectivity with health plans for billing. In essence physicians will use tools if they provide utility, added Arthur Leibowitz, M.D., Executive Vice President, Digital Health Strategy, Medscape.
Utility of PDAs for medicine has increased as memory, processing speed, and connectivity improved. Prescribing was a natural first application for medical PDAs because the small screen size could easily display the information captured on a 3 by 5 prescription pad. Functions as medical charge capturing and medical notes soon followed. This is the year of the wireless local area network (LAN) and next year is the year of the wireless wide area network (WAN), observed Richard Altinger. Alan Rubin, President and CEO of MDeverywhere does not currently see a demand by physicians to fully integrate electronic medical records and prescriptions. Currently physicians accept loose integration of charge capture, medical notes, and prescriptions. As the market for PDAs matures physicians will likely demand tighter integration.
For prescribing PDAs have been connected to fax machines at pharmacies. While pharmacies clearly see the value of electronic prescriptions to reduce costs and errors, they have not committed to providing connectivity to the physician side commented David Mullen, President and CFO of Allscripts Healthcare Solutions. It is estimated that two to four million phone calls are placed annually by pharmacists to physicians to clarify prescriptions at a cost of $6 to $8 per call. Imagine the reduction in costs if pharmacists could transmit queries to the PDA of physicians.
Why is the adoption rate of PDAs for health care low? Demographics of physicians play a role as evidenced by the lack of acceptance of these devices by physicians 48 years of age or older. Reimbursement of these devices is a second critical factor. While patients, insurance companies, employers, pharmacists, and physicians all benefit from these devices, to date physicians have borne most of the cost. However, pharmaceutical companies have made strategic investments in this technology.
Discussion closed by focusing on the potential uses of prescription data. All the current health care PDA companies are believed to act as application service providers (ASPs) storing the medical data captured on these devices. Physicians who oppose the provision of prescription data to third parties have declined to use PDAs in their clinical practices. Some providers of PDAs for healthcare are considering the provision of prescription fulfillment data about patients to their physicians and managed care organizations. While that data would identify the patients to their physicians it would not identify them to their managed care organizations. Provision of the data would assist physicians and managed care organizations in understanding patterns of compliance among their patients. Much of the controversy about providing this type of data centers on the question, who owns the data? The physicians and patients will play major roles in determining the answer to that question.
Questions? Contact Art Shedden, MD at Artshedden@aol.com . Art Shedden is a recent graduate of the Wharton School of Business and a former Director of Clinical Research (Neuroscience) at Merck & Co., Inc. Shedden & Associates helps pharmaceutical clients develop web-enabled work processes.