Once again, wow... life lag... almost 5 months since I posted something, anything!
Every year at this time I look around and wonder how I got here. Not in a sort of "Whoa, dude... like ... how much did I DRINK last night" got here, more of a life path, choices made, etc. etc.. I've always taken to the path of chaos, let the road choose me instead of I choose the road. When opportunities come I pause to consider them, sometimes I pause too long and good things pass me by, but that pause is usually instinct kicking in, disbelief, or my built in skepticism. Anyways I am rapidly going down the old path of self diagnosis and I'll stop there.
Winter 2008 seemed to be going well, job is enjoyable as jobs go, people I work with are great, the family is doing well, kids are getting bigger, as they tend to do. But then my boss read a letter from the Alberta Medical Association about a proposal from Alberta Health and Wellness that screwed all that up. Apparently our government in all of it's wisdom and greed and power hunger has decided to try and lure our EMR clients away to their chosen EMR software providers by giving them a big fat $20K bonus (per doctor). That's right, bonus. Nothing to do with setup costs, that's already provided for, nothing to do with anything, just "Here's $20K for your troubles".
Over the past couple years POSP has been trying to thin the crop of EMR providers by forcing us to jump through their insane hoops. Last year they came up with an RFP that was attainable by us, and we were well on our way to being compatible. Suddenly they decide "You don't have this this this and this feature" ... which is a lie, and they pick 3 vendors, all 3 from outside Alberta, one of which is actually affiliated with Alberta Medical Association!! None of which have fared very well vs. clinic staff/doctor opinion polls.
Do you think this will make a difference to doctors though? They'll take the $20K, switch over, put up with the new software until it drives them and their staff around the bend, then they'll be back. But in that time the other vendors in the province will lose real money, all because our government is a bunch of power hungry idiots. The only reason the $20K is being offered is because they've had ZERO interest in the 3 vendors, so they being the stubborn egomaniacs they are, are pushing forward no matter what. No matter how much it costs Albertans, or Alberta companies, no matter if we are in a recession, they are throwing millions of dollars at doctors to get them to use software they don't even want.
In Ontario EMR vendors, if they want to sell EMR have to pay money every so often to go through testing to make sure they are up to the Ontario medical standards. It's going well, it's still competitive, and they have multiple vendors. Why is it that the Alberta government has gone the way of the fascists and are trying to control and/or damage local businesses?