athenaIDX vs. CareLogic EHR

I couldn't recommend IDX to anyone. Most of the reviews on this site appear to be for the program that broke off from Athena IDX, Centricity Practice Solutions (CPS). CPS is a much more capable program managed by Unlimited Systems (a separate company) that should NOT be confused with Athena IDX (managed by Athena Health). It's possible that Athena IDX was usable in the 90s compared to other peer programs at that time, but there are so, so many better, modern solutions available now for far less money. This software is priced at the enterprise level with a level of quality that is below budget tier with an ancient feature set to boot.

Carelogic EHR, by Qualifacts is the second scheduling software my company has used, and so long as there are no unfortunate changes it will be our last. It is user friendly, meaning that it is easy to train employees in, and is well organized. The simple interface takes out much of the guess work.

Incentivized

• One of the best things about Centricity is it is flexible. We are able to add a data point behind a term (CPS calls this an observation term) and track any data needed. These observation terms also allow us to pull information forward and display information needed to make a good decision or used to decrease errors. For example in our history forms given to the patients one of the questions is side of injury. This affected side displays on our EMR forms which helps providers and prevents mistakes.
• CPS integrates with other programs. We are paperless and use DocuSign to send each patient their history, ROS and all new paperwork. This allows us to import the history into the forms and has saved us from adding extra staff (FTEs) to room and take history. The history form can be completed at home or in the waiting room. Each section has a observation term behind it and allows it to be placed into the note at the correct section. Since we have a fully integrated product we do not have to have another program to enter or transfer our charges from the EMR to the PM side of the program.
• Our notes look great! We did a lot of customization which gave us the detail and look we wanted. It seems like a lot of work at first, but the outcome has so much efficacy. We increased our providers without having to increase our staffing and it is due to he efficiencies we gained by using the EMR.
• One other note, Centricity is flexible but that means it is complicated. You can not have flexibility without it be complicated don't let that stop you the end results can be great.

Incentivized

• Schedule based- the schedule is easy to use.
• Documentation tied to appointment- no question regarding what to complete when a client comes in.
• Prescription software integration with PDMP- no need to check state sites.

Incentivized

• Statements print only current open accounts, would be nice to print a total statement for patients so they can see if payments are split between open and closed/zeroed out accounts
• Ability to create custom reports

Incentivized

• It is difficult to obtain information from CareLogic for use in customized reports if the user is not familiar with building reports in Pentaho.
• Rather than having the capability to transmit electronic prescriptions on its own, CareLogic relies on an external program to do so. Prescribers must exit out of the document they are in so that they can access the external electronic prescription system. This system has an additional cost. It would be nice if it could be an all in one system.
• While the company is usually eager to respond to customer needs, something always seems to be broken or need updating in regards to functionality. This may be a function of our agency's location and the unusual needs we have due to our state mandates, but it is tiring to always have to worry about a workaround.

Incentivized

The rating of "3" represents CareLogic's quick loading of pages, however, the reports are super slow and there is no progress bar or notification to let you know if a report is running or not. I've let a report run for an hour before only to find out that the interface never registered my click to run the report.

Incentivized

The customer support at Qualifacts is great. When you have an issue you can submit a ticket to support and they're on top of getting things straightened out and always available by phone as well. The struggle with the overall support is it doesn't seem like the needs of the users are heard. When you ask for what should be a simple fix or something that seems the system is missing, it gets labeled an Enhancement Request which is where requests go to pasture.

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Training consists of overly specific points with no general process considerations. Trainers will regularly go 'into the weeds' on pointless edge cases while the meat of the training still needs to be addressed.

Athena IDX is more reliable than other platforms. It rarely has latency challenges where it has to be intermittently shut down or updated. It is accessible on multiple devices and overall, easy to use and navigate.

Incentivized

CareLogic is more a affordable that other competitors. CareLogic takes less time to understand and incorporate. I would say that it has its limitations and is not as intuitive. There is a lot of clicking back and forth between functions and can be annoying. There is also sometimes loss of data. If something goes wrong in the program there is no backup- this may be something that can be added, but my company has chosen not to

Incentivized

The pricing structure is outlandish for how old and feature poor this program is.

Zero ownership. Zero responsibility. Zero desire to build something good.

• Extremely expensive software for the limited feature set. We're talking millions of dollars with off hours support (anything outside of 8-6EST) that starts at $1200 for the first hour and $300 for each hour afterwards.
• Multitasking isn't a thing unless you assign more licenses (thereby increasing your costs). Users can quite literally only have one IDX window open at a time unless you assign more licenses. This slows down everyone as there are plenty of times where examining different parts of a patient's profile is useful.
• Reporting has been nearly impossible as we use modern reporting software. IDX's analytics site is firmly stuck in the 1990s and lacks decades of innovation present in something like Power BI.
• Nickel and diming philosophy. A limited API server costs ~$10k/month. Setting up a new facility in IDX costs you and requires a 4 month lead time. Many more instances of this.

• No more paper records.
• Prescriptions never get lost.
• Staff have many complaints about work flow.
• New hire training has to be ongoing- it's hard to learn.

Incentivized