OpenEMR - Software Solution for Medical Practices
Ben Frein
OpenEMR is the most widely distributed EMR system in the work. This HIPAA compliant open source electronic medial records system is based on the most widely used standards for maximum compatibility. OpenEMR has been developed by the global efforts of many physicians and developers and is based on HTML, CSS, Javascript, PHP, and MySQL technologies. 'It facilitates efficient office management through automated patient record journaling and billing integration, and has been successfully integrated with third-party technologies including speech recognition, secure wireless access, touch screen portables, and biometric authentication. Interface screens are customizable and optimized for consistency, simplicity, speed of access to patient information, and minimum eye strain.' http://www.synitech.com/openemr
OpenEMR is programmed to run on a linux server using Apache, PHP, and MySQL, but can also be run on Windows machines running VMware. There are also commercial companies which sell bootable versions of OpenEMR. The wide range of platforms and setups make OpenEMR very easy to implement, even for someone with a lack of technical knowledge.
OpenEMR is browser based which makes it flexible, secure, and easy to maintain. Being browser based also makes OpenEMR platform independent and allows it to be run on handhelds, tablets, cell phones, and Macs. All of the screens, forms, and reports in OpenEMR are easily customizable with standard PHP, HTML, and CSS knowledge. An additional feature of being browser based is that OpenEMR can be remotely accessed from any standard web browser. This is of course assuming the security of the server is maintained and a proper security certificate is installed to conduct secure transfers of the sensitive information over the internet. This is an extremely useful feature for hospitals and clinics that have more than one location, as all of the patient and billing data can be stored in a central server.
OpenEMR does not restrict itself to one coding system, but supports a flexible system including CPT, HCPCS, and ICD codes. You are also allowed to add more codes. OpenEMR allows you to bill insurance companies by one code, yet diagnose via another. Prescriptions can be written through the system and then either Emailed, Faxed, or Printed. When writing the prescription a search can be done for an unknown drug. This lookup is accomplished in the background by connecting to the web site rxlist.com. Another feature of OpenEMR includes the ability to interface with SQL-Ledger, an open source project for advanced accounting features.
OpenEMR has the ability to print a paper record containing all of the electronic medical record's data. This is especially useful if a patient is being refered to a specialist or when the record needs to be produced for legal issues. A self installing .rpm version of OpenEMR has been released as a beta for Mandrake 10 and 10.1
OpenEMR was originally released in June of 2001, but was not open source. It was released under the name MedicalPractice Professional by Synitech. After reworking much of the system and code to become HIPAA compliant and more secure, the system was then reintroduced as OpenEMR in June 2002. In January of 2004, the Pennington Firm took over as the primary maintainer and helped to make the medical community more aware of OpenEMR. The project's code base is now SourceForge.
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