The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted every facet of life—especially our healthcare system. Both hospitals and office-based physicians saw how crucial it was to access and share a patient’s health data safely and easily. As a result, the Global Electronic Health Record (EHR) Market is forecasted to grow from an estimated $30 billion in 2020 to $40 billion by 2025.
Managed service providers (MSPs) are poised to play a major role in the market’s growth, allowing healthcare organizations to outsource their EHR data center management so that they don’t have to make large investments for in-house systems, saving money and resources.
In addition, experts also note that cloud based EHRs are more secure than in-house systems. So, it’s not surprising that even the Department of Defense (DoD) is outsourcing their EHR system deployment. The agency recently awarded Leidos a pair of 18-month task orders worth $104.5 million combined to help the DoD deploy the MHS Genesis electronic health record system to military bases across the U.S. MHS Genesis will serve as a common patient record for DoD, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the U.S. Coast Guard, and private-sector health care providers.
The first task order, valued at $66 million, covers site deployment assistance within the country’s eastern and southern areas, while the second task order, valued at $38.5 million, will have Leidos assist Texas-based military treatment facilities in implementing the new EHR platform. Back in November, the company revealed that it was able to continue deployments of the MHS Genesis at military treatment facilities (MTFs) in Nevada, California, and Alaska during the pandemic.
Tech giants have also been working on platforms that can benefit both healthcare providers and patients. In April, Google announced the launch of its Google Care Healthcare API, which will enable standardized information sharing between healthcare apps and Google Cloud systems. And Microsoft launched Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare, created to bring together integrated capabilities to boost patient engagement and connect health teams for better collaboration, decision-making, and operational efficiencies.
But even smaller MSPs, as well as IT consultants, will likely see a boost in business. Data shows that two-thirds of IT leaders from health systems and hospitals currently utilize cloud-based technology, while 30% of practices that house more than 11 clinicians are looking to replace their EHR system sometime this year.
