If you’re a dentist looking for electronic health record (EHR) software for your practice, you’re going to come across at least 300 options in the market today. And if you’re looking for a dental-specific EHR, you’re going to have even fewer options.
Even fewer of those options are going to run on a Macintosh computer. For those dentists that are interested in going Apple in their office, there are three options:
- Software designed specifically for Macintosh computers;
- Web based EMR; and,
- Running a virtual machine.
Chris Thorman of Medical Software Advice breaks down these options in one of his latest blog posts. You can read it all at his blog: Mac EMR Software | A Guide to Medical Software for Apple Computers.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Dental Scarsdale // May 28, 2010 at 5:02 am
Hey, this is Robert from Gtdentistry. Just came to your blog for the first time. I like your informative posts. Though dental-specific EHR have fewer options as you say, I think this sort of EHR needs to installed since effective use of electronic health records will decrease chances of medical faults and errors and also aid analysts to assess quality.
2 Dental Scarsdale // May 28, 2010 at 5:02 am
Hey, this is Robert from Gtdentistry. Just came to your blog for the first time. I like your informative posts. Though dental-specific EHR have fewer options as you say, I think this sort of EHR needs to installed since effective use of electronic health records will decrease chances of medical faults and errors and also aid analysts to assess quality.
3 Vaughan dentist // May 29, 2010 at 7:04 am
This is a great option for software for those who prefer using Apple in their dental office.
4 Vaughan dentist // May 29, 2010 at 7:04 am
This is a great option for software for those who prefer using Apple in their dental office.
5 cosmetic dentist // Jun 1, 2010 at 10:52 pm
EHR software for dental is something new to me. But if its active, will be more better. Thanks for your information.
6 cosmetic dentist // Jun 1, 2010 at 10:52 pm
EHR software for dental is something new to me. But if its active, will be more better. Thanks for your information.
7 dental surgery // Jun 2, 2010 at 2:55 am
a great tool to help minimise errors but any software is only as good as the user.
8 dental surgery // Jun 2, 2010 at 2:55 am
a great tool to help minimise errors but any software is only as good as the user.
9 D. Kellus Pruitt DDS // Jun 8, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Robert from Gtdentistry, I found your reply interesting.
When you say that “effective use of electronic health records will decrease chances of medical faults,” on what do you base that claim? Secondly, what do you mean when you say that eDRs will aid analysts assess quality? What analysts? On what are they going to base quality, insurance claims?
What do you know that we don’t?
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
10 D. Kellus Pruitt DDS // Jun 8, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Robert from Gtdentistry, I found your reply interesting.
When you say that “effective use of electronic health records will decrease chances of medical faults,” on what do you base that claim? Secondly, what do you mean when you say that eDRs will aid analysts assess quality? What analysts? On what are they going to base quality, insurance claims?
What do you know that we don’t?
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
11 D. Kellus Pruitt DDS // Jun 11, 2010 at 5:34 pm
Dear Robert from Gtdentistry:
On May 28th, you casually mentioned that you expect analysts to assess quality in dentistry, so I asked you for more information about it. http://www.dentalblogs.com/archives/administrator/electronic-health-records-for-dentists-the-scoop/comment-page-1/#comment-37149
I scan the news closely for stakeholders’ plans for quality control in dentistry just like you refer to. My most recent sighting of information about national intentions was a commentary by Dr. James D. Bader in the December 2009 edition of the JADA titled “Challenges in quality assessment of dental care.”
http://jada.ada.org/cgi/content/full/140/12/1456
Dr. Bader – a fervent supporter of Evidence-Based Dentistry as well as paperless practices – describes an oppressive, micromanaged future for dentistry. The operative dentistry instructor reasons that quality assessment is important so that real dentists can prove to the nation that their care is better than almost-dentists. I say that is a lame reason for interference in dentist-patient relationships.
The first time I heard about the connection between HIPAA and quality control was in February 2006 when an employee in the ADA Department of Dental Informatics accidentally hinted at those plans in an email. When I asked him to elaborate, just like you, he failed to respond. I then pressed the issue like I often do, and ultimately, a Senior ADA Vice President requested that I stop asking his employees questions about HIPAA and to write a letter to the editor of the JADA if I wasn’t satisfied with evasion. So as you can see, that is why I’m hoping you will be more forthcoming with what you know, Gtdentistry. I get tired of the runaround.
I don’t come empty handed.
Since you show an interest, let me share some recent information about the progress of the national plan for quality control in healthcare that appeared a few days after you brought up the topic on dentalblogs.com.
“Clinical Analytics: Can Organizations Maximize Clinical Data?” was published on June 7, by HIMSS Analytics. It doesn’t look good for HIT and analytics stakeholders like Dr. Bader.
http://www.himssanalytics.org/docs/Clinical_Analytics.pdf
Today, Bernie Monegain, Editor of Healthcare IT News, posted his opinion of the results that were released yesterday “Study reveals limited expectations for use of clinical data”
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/study-reveals-limited-expectations-use-clinical-data
In Monegain’s opinion, there are serious IT problems that might or might not be successfully solved before application of an imperfect quality control system to physicians’ practices. Personally, I think Monegain wrote a happy article. If the US government has this much difficulty accessing physicians’ patients’ private data for their biased algorithm tricks, dental practices in the nation will prove to be impossible to micromanage, and Pay for Performance will continue to be only stakeholders’ fantasy of utopia.
After all, our fees are much less than physicians’, and because of the nature of our work, the NPI number cannot be used to leverage our practices from the free market. Some of us will always accept full payment at the time of service as part of the deal with consumers who prefer to see dentists of their choice anyway – not the dentists preferred by HHS computers.
We should be thankful that Adam Smith’s theories of economics he described at the time of the American revolution against tyranny over two hundred years ago still trumps Bush/Obama’s plans for an artificial healthcare market. Healthy competition with colleagues naturally weeds out almost all HIT parasites in American dentistry. It’s difficult to sell digital interoperability when a dentist using a pegboard, ledger cards and the US mail can already sell dentistry cheaper and safer than paperless dentists – even while clearing more profit per procedure.
To tell you the truth, Gtdentistry, I hope Dr. James Bader and other stakeholders who depend on eDRs never succeed. For every dollar we are forced to raise our fees for even good ideas, someone in our community, likely a child with a toothache, can no longer afford our care. Let’s not carelessly assist others to cause our patients harm. What do you say, Gtdentistry?
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
12 D. Kellus Pruitt DDS // Jun 11, 2010 at 5:34 pm
Dear Robert from Gtdentistry:
On May 28th, you casually mentioned that you expect analysts to assess quality in dentistry, so I asked you for more information about it. http://www.dentalblogs.com/archives/administrator/electronic-health-records-for-dentists-the-scoop/comment-page-1/#comment-37149
I scan the news closely for stakeholders’ plans for quality control in dentistry just like you refer to. My most recent sighting of information about national intentions was a commentary by Dr. James D. Bader in the December 2009 edition of the JADA titled “Challenges in quality assessment of dental care.”
http://jada.ada.org/cgi/content/full/140/12/1456
Dr. Bader – a fervent supporter of Evidence-Based Dentistry as well as paperless practices – describes an oppressive, micromanaged future for dentistry. The operative dentistry instructor reasons that quality assessment is important so that real dentists can prove to the nation that their care is better than almost-dentists. I say that is a lame reason for interference in dentist-patient relationships.
The first time I heard about the connection between HIPAA and quality control was in February 2006 when an employee in the ADA Department of Dental Informatics accidentally hinted at those plans in an email. When I asked him to elaborate, just like you, he failed to respond. I then pressed the issue like I often do, and ultimately, a Senior ADA Vice President requested that I stop asking his employees questions about HIPAA and to write a letter to the editor of the JADA if I wasn’t satisfied with evasion. So as you can see, that is why I’m hoping you will be more forthcoming with what you know, Gtdentistry. I get tired of the runaround.
I don’t come empty handed.
Since you show an interest, let me share some recent information about the progress of the national plan for quality control in healthcare that appeared a few days after you brought up the topic on dentalblogs.com.
“Clinical Analytics: Can Organizations Maximize Clinical Data?” was published on June 7, by HIMSS Analytics. It doesn’t look good for HIT and analytics stakeholders like Dr. Bader.
http://www.himssanalytics.org/docs/Clinical_Analytics.pdf
Today, Bernie Monegain, Editor of Healthcare IT News, posted his opinion of the results that were released yesterday “Study reveals limited expectations for use of clinical data”
http://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/study-reveals-limited-expectations-use-clinical-data
In Monegain’s opinion, there are serious IT problems that might or might not be successfully solved before application of an imperfect quality control system to physicians’ practices. Personally, I think Monegain wrote a happy article. If the US government has this much difficulty accessing physicians’ patients’ private data for their biased algorithm tricks, dental practices in the nation will prove to be impossible to micromanage, and Pay for Performance will continue to be only stakeholders’ fantasy of utopia.
After all, our fees are much less than physicians’, and because of the nature of our work, the NPI number cannot be used to leverage our practices from the free market. Some of us will always accept full payment at the time of service as part of the deal with consumers who prefer to see dentists of their choice anyway – not the dentists preferred by HHS computers.
We should be thankful that Adam Smith’s theories of economics he described at the time of the American revolution against tyranny over two hundred years ago still trumps Bush/Obama’s plans for an artificial healthcare market. Healthy competition with colleagues naturally weeds out almost all HIT parasites in American dentistry. It’s difficult to sell digital interoperability when a dentist using a pegboard, ledger cards and the US mail can already sell dentistry cheaper and safer than paperless dentists – even while clearing more profit per procedure.
To tell you the truth, Gtdentistry, I hope Dr. James Bader and other stakeholders who depend on eDRs never succeed. For every dollar we are forced to raise our fees for even good ideas, someone in our community, likely a child with a toothache, can no longer afford our care. Let’s not carelessly assist others to cause our patients harm. What do you say, Gtdentistry?
D. Kellus Pruitt DDS
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