Epic offers a suite of medical practice management and EHR software.
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Kareo EHR
Score 1.5 out of 10
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Kareo provides a full-featured EHR. The vendor says it is designed to fit the way its users work. Some key features include: Comprehensive Dashboard, Powerful Scheduler, and Flexible Documentation and Notes.
Epic is great to access from home or anywhere there is a wifi connection. It is very convenient for office or hospital employees. One time when it is not optimal is when I write a Certification of Terminal Illness for a hospice patient. I can never see it again. It drops off of Epic. I wish those notes would remain.
Kareo is not an appropriate application for any real-world clinical need. It is highly unreliable, crashing frequently, and often becomes frozen. It also cannot ingest data from Therapy Notes, which was a promised feature of the platform according to the sales team. Additionally, when we ran into reliability issues (every day, with every clinician at the practice, across a dozen different office locations with different internet service providers) we were not offered the ability to cancel our contract. Until the reliability issues are fixed Kareo is not well-suited to any use case because it does not work.
Interdisciplinary Communication: The care of patients improves when you are able to have the entire care team communicate with each other. Epic makes this process very easy by utilizing one chart for all physicians in the organizations. Care decisions and patient safety are greatly improved by seeing past decision making processes.
Patient Communication: With features like MyChart and Care Everywhere, Epic gives patients a great deal of control over their information. MyChart acts like a patient portal allowing them to see what their providers have to say, see lab results, make payments, and share information with their doctor all from a mobile device or computer. Having features like this allow the patient to take part in their care.
Improves Claim Efficiency: The way that Epic handles insurance claims is incredible. Claims are correct and double checked before they are sent to the insurance companies. This in turn, reduces the number of denials and improves the speed of payments.
Kareo was a massive waste of money. It's an unreliable product without promised features and sold by a disingenuous sales team. We will stick to reliable services like Doxy, Therapy Notes, etc.
You should invest time into taking a training class before using Epic, but once you get the hang of it the usability features are endless! My favorite part about Epic is how it is automated and "trained" to catch user errors that would typically be missed in normal documentation/charting. This ensures accuracy and eliminates errors.
A dedicated support staff for each module/area is provided by Epic. This is beneficial for points of contact, however, not all support staff are created equal, and there seems to be high turnover in these roles(staff seems to turn over every 1-2 years). This can make it challenging for continuity and quick support resolution as new staff are not as familiar with organization-specific needs, environments, and/or questions.
Epic gives extensive customization options in terms of utility and view. I have found this to be highly useful and efficient EHR as compared to other EHRs we use in our organization.
I selected Kareo EHR because it was a lot simpler to use and the customer service was definitely better. Every representative I have spoken to has been super friendly and helpful.
It must have had a positive impact as things get done quicker, leading to easier billing/coding. It must be saving a lot of money and time. I am not aware of a better product.
We have negative reviews as we were sold a product that left out some key variables. Things we really needed to make the transition.
I don't think KAREO is good for small business (0-10 employees) because their prices for additional or standard features is steep. They charge by the therapist to boot and it is steep!
Again ASK questions; do a test run; ask about the migration of your data and its charges.
You sign with them you will be locked into a 12 month contract with no out clause. If they are costing you the money you have to stay with them.
