The Value of Incremental HIT Modernization

The announcement of a new CMS ruling should really be regarded as a good thing. After all, each new regulatory requirement is intended to improve healthcare delivery and administration, which is always a worthwhile endeavor. But in practice, new CMS rulings often elicit a very different response. We rarely see healthcare leaders jumping for joy when CMS issues a new rule; instead, leaders are usually frustrated, confused, or scrambling to figure out how to remain compliant with the updated guidelines.

For some organizations, this frustration stems from an overreliance on single-use-case solutions that are narrowly designed to meet the most recent compliance requirements. These organizations can find themselves in a cycle of continuous upgrades: when regulations inevitably evolve, they have no choice but to invest in the next new solution, even if their last investment still hasn’t yielded meaningful returns.

Other organizations have the opposite problem: in a bid to reduce overhead costs, these organizations haven’t invested enough in compliance over the years. Instead, they’ve poured time and internal resources into building fully homegrown systems or bolting on DIY applications to a few core external solutions, making updates as needed in response to new regulations. Each new rule increases the total cost of modernization, and making upgrades internally creates more technical debt.

So how can executives respond to regulatory changes without overhauling their systems, incurring technical debt, or adding yet another single-function solution to their HIT infrastructure? Embracing incremental modernization is a good start.

Learn more by reading our blog here: https://resources.edifecs.com/social-blog-the-value-of-incremental-hit-modernization