More than eight in 10 hospitals said comprehensive outsourced tech support from their vendor will be a top competitive differentiator this year.
Outsourced tech support is on the rise, as 35 percent of hospitals with more than 100 beds expect their tech support outsourcing spend to grow by 100 percent by the end of the year. However, quality and source of this type of support is becoming a key factor: 61 percent of hospitals prefer their EHR vendor provide direct tech support, and 79 percent of hospitals using third party outsourcing tech support are dissatisfied with the outsourced services.
“Enterprise tech support is a highly complex and niche area in healthcare, where specialists can make a big difference in client loyalty by catering from Level 1 to Level 4 product support to ensure all the providers’ business goals are aligned with technology readiness,” said Doug Brown, managing partner of Black Book. “Unfortunately, many vendors leave tech support duties and quality to the users and third party outsourcers, yet it’s turned out to be one of 2016’s most critical components of client loyalty to their EHR.”
The survey indicated Cerner is the only vendor offering comprehensive, four-level technical support. Other highly scoring vendors providing full, four-level technical support are Allscripts, MEDITECH and McKesson, according to the survey.
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