Greenway Health Prime Suite

We went from paper charts and a little $ software the doc purchased when he started the practice back about 20 years ago, to Greenway's PrimeSuite in 2007. It was an awesome experience because they sent people to our office to spend a few days training on the PM side and we went live on it first.Then they sent the clinical side trainers back a month later to get the physicians trained on template building and gave us great instructions on how to implement it slowly rather than jumping in with both feet. We recently merged with another site who also went on PS about 4 years ago. They aren't utilizing it to it's fullest capacity so I am hoping to train them and get them to loving it as much as we do!

Vantaggi

It's built on one platform rather than the chart side being separate from the PM side like some of the earlier EHR's were. Support is wonderful...love the live chat when it's available. The Greenway community website is very helpful to log cases and blog with other users. If I have an urgent support issue I can call support and get help from the person who answers the phone or they will get me to someone to help me. That is a real plus when you have doctors in the clinic and they have a script error or something urgent.

Inconvenienti

The thing I like least is user rights. I wish there was an easier way to know which user right affects which part of the software. It's sometimes called something totally different in user rights than what it is called in the software. Setting up new users would be easier if we could copy another user.
Wish there were a little help with PQRS, MU, MACRAS & MIPS. It's pretty difficult for specialties to meet the requirements and takes a lot of research, google and networking with others to get it done. I don't know if we ever did get enough measures in the list to make our last MU attestation.

Consigli utili

Go to ENGAGE and check out the awesome resources available when you become a Greenway customer.

We have used this product since August of 2011. Since then, we have seen this EHR go through it’s growing pains, but ultimately, continues to improve and build on a platform that is more user-friendly and customizable (by non-techinical personnel which ultimately lowers overall cost of ownership) than many others out there in the market. No EHR is perfect and anyone touting such is not providing a realistic assessment of the current state of EHRs. There are definite pros and cons of each and ultimately, decisions need to be made with systems that have more pros than cons. As with any EHR system, you will only see maximum efficiency if the proper time is taken to perform the right set-up and then continuous process evaluation to tweak and adjust as the practice moves forward.

Vantaggi

Ability of non-technical users to update and adjust templates without requiring the assistance of highly-paid consultants or users with advanced “technical” expertise. The new orders module helps tremendously for many different areas and can be used to help with PQRS, in-office lab testing or imaging (and has helped us with many audits to provide evidence of ordering and interpretation of said tests), and many other areas (including questionnaires). The new mobile version is one of the best I’ve seen and the interface continues to improve. It’ll really be a game-changer once the ability to chart form mobile is released. I think this will expand the ability to chart from an iPad (or iPhone if a doc chooses) compared to a clunky computer or laptop. The additional modules (while they do cost extra, but at a reasonable rate), integrate well for a patient portal, messaging system, PQRS registry, population health management, and clearinghouse. Finally, the Meaningful Use reporting system is one of the best I’ve seen. It makes it easy to track how physicians are performing throughout the year and make adjustments to help meet MU criteria. While it is already good, a future update should make it even better. I best not forget that have a dedicated Client Experience Manager and dedicated account executive helps to keep a personal touch with how we are performing as a practice and act as a liaison with the company executives.

Inconvenienti

The correspondence module for referral letters is really weak and needs a major overall. We still have to resort to transcription for more customized and stream-lined correspondence (versus sending the entire note). We know things are trying to move to a more electronic medium in communication, however, some docs will never abandon their fax machines and still really on paper charts. As such, we must maintain a quick and efficient method for communicating with these referring physicians.

Direct messaging is good, but currently feels more like an after-thought. It will be nice when this is truly and fully incorporated into the software.

The interface does seem a little dated, however, we have been told there are plans to overhaul the user experience and interface in the coming year to give it a “fresher” appearance more in line with the current mobile offering.

We are a privately owned clinic with 29 (currently) providers. We had paper charts until 2013 when we went with Greenway. We chose Greenway because our providers decided that they wanted to still do as much dictation as they could, which Greenway allowed us to do. Through the past couple of years and learning to build the templates we need, this dictation hasn't been such a priority for the providers, but the ones that want to do this, can still do it with a Nuance product and PrimeMobile solutions. In 2014 we outsourced our billing with Greenway's Revenue Management. This was a challenge to get everyone on the same page, but persistence and sticking with it we are now happy with the choice to do this. We ended up downsizing about 15 of our billing personnel when we did this, so we knew we HAD to make it work and we did. We do not use the Greenway Patient Portal, when we began with Greenway the only option to us was to use the Medfusion portal and now that the Greenway Patient portal exists, it would not be beneficial to switch over. Greenway and MedFusion do not currently have a way to seamlessly transfer our patients from one portal to the other. The staff at Greenway has been VERY helpful. If we have an issue and it isn't resolved, i have been known to go up the chain to get some solution to a problem and that has not been a problem for Greenway staff. The training was exceptional when we went live on both practice and chart. We do have several interfaces with Greenway: lab, radiology, portal, etc and that have been an issue that our IT department has been working with Greenway on. The API's don't seem to be stable for some reason, it seems to be an issue that upgrades and hot-fixes cause the interfaces to have issues. Our nursing and doctors have gotten good at using Greenway and there are so many ways to do things within the software, which makes it flexible for different types of users and workflows.

Vantaggi

Ease of use and the intuitiveness in using it.

We have a customer experience manager, we can call her at any time with questions and she helps us out, she is very helpful.

If you need a report and you can't figure out how to create it, call support, they will set it up for you. Tons of reports.

Inconvenienti

Sometimes when calling support, you will get someone on the phone that tells you to do something, that you KNOW you shouldn't do. Greenway has promised that they would get a better support solution and they have delivered. It is alot better than it was in the past.

Sometimes the billing invoices are not to be trusted and convoluted. They are hard to read, not logical in any sense, do not indicate what exactly the charges are for and the same charge will appear in numerous places on the statement. We have to review the statement every time before payment is made.

Consigli utili

Greenway has a yearly conference that has MANY training/sessions that help you to understand the software and things that can be done with it that you didn't even think of. This is a great time to meet the personnel and collaborate on ideas, problems, etc.. We have gone for several years and have benefited each year in doing so. We have several "super users", 2 nurses, 2 IT staff, 2 billing staff and 2 doctors and we all go to these meetings each year.

Don't expect it all to be ready for you to go on Go-Live, it is a constant change to get things the way you want them, as i would guess it would be with ANY EMR system. Patience and eventually you will get it to where it is smooth and you can see your patients and get out of the office at a decent time every day.

At Go-live, for the first week, have the providers cut their schedules back a little bit, about 1/2 and give time between patients so you can get your new workflows worked out.

Get to know your "go to" people within Greenway. They can be helpful to you when you need it.

We've been using Primesuite since 2013. We are a large (and growing) Gastro practice in Florida with about 250 users and 20 locations. We migrated every office over from their EMR/ paper onto Primesuite and just like any other EMR, we have had many ups and downs along the way. We have experienced growing pains on our end as well as growing pains on Greenway's end. No one is going to be 100% satisfied with their EMR company, but it's the nature of the beast. I like the flexibility we have with the system and the ability to customize so many different features for all our individual locations that it allows them to still practice as individuals. That being said, the more flexibility you have, the more confusing or harder it can be to grasp all the different possibilities. On the clinical side, there are many different ways you can tailor a workflows for each user in the office from set up, templates, orders, filters, tasks, etc.... I feel it is extremely user friendly and you can customize the system to fully utilize your time and streamline documentation in order to focus more on the patient. HOWEVER, you have to put the work into building it for YOURSELF.
On the other hand, I have heard it's a lot tougher than some of the previous systems on the practice/ billing side- especially since we need to keep everything separated by location. The larger we get the slower the system is in sending out claims or harder to run reports. I have heard a good bit of complaints from the billing side. I feel the clinical side of this software is better than the practice side, but I also mostly work on the clinical side. For larger practices there are a number of areas that need improvement, but you will find that in most systems as well.

Vantaggi

I like the flexibility and customization for the providers/ staff in order to accommodate the individual roles in the office. I also enjoy the patient portal and having patients log in and fill out their paperwork on line so it populates the chart. That saves a lot of data entry time. I also appreciate the webinars they send out and the training they have online to keep everyone updated with the changes. They also have a large conference once a year to focus on continued education and training within the systems. They have very knowledgeable resources working these events and allow you to bounce ideas off of them or speak with them face to face about what you are experiencing. They are always very friendly and helpful. You can schedule one on one time with management or with an expert in Primesuite. It's also one of the greatest networking experiences to speak with other practices on the same system as you. You can ask how they utilize the system or what they would recommend for workflows if you are struggling. I find that conference is well worth attending for anyone who is starting out on the system or who has been on it for years. One last thing would be the people that work there. Everyone you talk to in support is very helpful and pleasant to speak with. We'd be lost without a few specific people that we work with on a weekly or quarterly basis.

Inconvenienti

I hate that the system cannot separate out (HL7) documents coming into the system by office location. They are all mixed together so that's very frustrating the bigger we get. The staff have to sort through all the providers to find their own physician's documents. This is something that affects larger groups the most. I have not personally seen a solution yet, however they might have something to fix this- but I will believe it when I see it. Also the reporting for the CBO is getting to be an issue and we don't know if it's because of our size, our servers, the product version we upgraded to, ISP, etc.....

Consigli utili

If you are going to buy this system, please be willing to work to set it up exactly how you want to utilize it. If you just run with the basics without modifying it for yourself, you will be frustrated and wasting your time and money. It's so customizable and there is plenty of documentation and training videos on their customer community website. DON'T skim on the training. It will save you a lot of frustration in the end. Ask for references for groups your size and talk to them about their experiences and about their setup. The company has changed a lot since 2015 so there was a time when the customer service was far below par due to a company merge. It has climbed back up and I believe they are in a much better place than they were mid 2015 (if you see reviews from that time period). I believe in 2013 and 2014, they probably had the best customer service in the industry (but I'm biased). They are trying to get back to that point. Be sure to ask questions directly to people on the system and what their experiences are with down time, customer service, promptness, what to expect on road ahead, etc....

We are Lakeland Surgical Clinic and we consist of 8 board certified general surgeons located in Jackson Ms. We offer the latest surgical techniques in Robotic, Bariatric, Laparoscopic, Breast and General Surgery in 7 different facilities in the greater Jackson area.

We have been with Greenway Medical Technologies since January 1st, 2005. We were with Companion Technologies, which at that time they were trying to go EHR and never could get there. Our new, younger physicians had wanted to look at a more user friendly computer system and they wanted something that would take us into the future.

We are currently on the latest version of PrimeSuite and the capabilites are endless. I actually went through the implementation process in 2004 and went to Carrollton for training. They actually sat down with us one-on-one and what they helped us build, we are still using in our office today. When it came time for the office as a whole to train, Greenway sent four trainers (two for chart and two for administrative) and they made the transition as smooth as possible. They made sure that everyone, including the physicians, were comfortable using the system before they left.

The support that we get from them is like no other. They pride themselves on really helping the consumer. I remember before we actually hired ICS as our IT company we were trying to do it ourselves. Well, one of the network switches went down so half of our office was not able to work. I did not really know what to do except to call Greenway Support. I was in a panic and Al who works in support and Greenway diagnosed my problem, he then called Best Buy to get them to hold the piece of equipment that I would need to replace and then he walked me through getting those users back online again. Now if that is not customer service then I am not sure what is.

We currently have implemented PrimeMobile, PrimePatient, PrimeSpeech and parts of PrimeDataCloud. Each of these Primes are awesome in their own right.

PrimeMobile is great becasue the physician can actually in put a picture or free text a note directly into the patients chart from the hospital while they are making their rounds. They can also check their schedule, view the full patients chart and create a charge from their phone/ipad.

PrimePatient is a very nice feature because the patient can communicate with us through this portal without having to make a phone call. The Patient forms and Health History forms that the patient fills out online directly imports into our system. The patient can also pay their bill on line as well as request prescriptions, medical records, ask a question to our nurses/doctors and even make their own appointment.

PrimeSpeech, which our doctor LOVES gives him the capability to dictate directly into the chart, which improves time savings and accuracy.

PrimeDataCloud is where we go to visit our dashboards. This holds our PQRS measures and it is very user friendly when you go to fill out the information and submit it all to CMS. You have the ability the send patient records for a single visit to other providers/hospitals.

With the help of Greenway Medical Technologies and their Primes we have been able to achieve meaninful use Stage 1 Year 2. We have attested and recieved 266,500.00 in Incenitive money. So if we had it to do all over again, well you bet your bottom dollar we would do things exactly the same.