Metropolitan OBGYN is an independent obstetrics and gynecology practice providing services for women in all stages of life. With seven physicians and two nurse practitioners, Metro OBGYN operates out of multiple offices in the Twin Cities area, and has affiliated hospitals that refer their patients to them. In spite of the struggling economy, Metro OBGYN has recently opened a new office in Woodbury, and has plans of adding another physician in the next year.

 

Metro OBGYN was running an EMR application that hadn’t been updated since its implementation. “The solution may have gone forward, but Metro didn’t go with it,” said Deb Hastings, Metro OBGYN’s Project Manager for EMR and PM implementation. The clinic didn’t have an IT person that had the technical knowledge or the time necessary to make the updates that were required – so they never got done. Backups were done consistently, but were never stored off site, and were never tested for ease of recovery.

 

As clinic leaders began exploring other options for EMR applications, they realized that to implement a new EMR system, they would need to hire an internal IT person just to support, maintain, and update the application and hardware it required.

 

“Even with hiring an IT professional, there would still be issues with backup, security and redundancy,” said Diane Murray, Clinic Administrator at Metro OBGYN. “After seeing the data center and how secure the data was from a disaster recovery and redundancy standpoint, I knew we couldn’t duplicate that model in house.”

 

In March 2008, Metro OBGYN hired Solbrekk to provide their IT network support, and soon recognized the advantages of outsourcing with Solbrekk-Netgain. “There was no doubt that the Solbrekk-Netgain combination was the best,” Deb Hastings said. “The collective IT expertise and experience of Solbrekk and Netgain would provide us with a complete virtual desktop and application hosting solution that would position us for future growth.”

 

To make the transition to EMR smooth, Murray recalls that Netgain COO Matt Riley sat in on weekly conference calls with Metro’s team and EMR vendor, Greenway, and helped them through the process. “Without Matt’s help,” Murray said, “it just would have been over our heads.”

 

In late April 2008 Metro OBGYN went live with Netgain hosting all of its applications, including PM and EMR solutions. Dr. Ron Less, M.D. said, “There wasn’t really any difference connecting to Netgain rather than logging into an internal system. Everything went really smoothly.”

 

There is always a risk of hardware failure with an in-house system, then the unforeseen costs of purchasing replacement equipment, but by having Solbrekk-Netgain as its IT department, Metro OBGYN knows the costs upfront and can budget accordingly.

 

As the State of Minnesota moves toward eHealth mandates like e-prescribing and interoperable EMR, Metro OBGYN is ahead of the curve and enjoying not having to feel the pressure of installing new systems.

 

“To be honest,” Dr. Less said, “I don’t care how IT works. I just want to treat my patients.” Dr. Less and all of the Metro OBGYN doctors now can access patient files and information from any of the clinic locations and more efficiently serve their patients. With an in house system, IT could hinder growth because of staffing, space and hardware needs.

 

When there are technology issues, Metro OBGYN can call the Netgain helpdesk and get immediate support. “Every call I’ve made to Netgain support staff has been above and beyond what’s expected,” Hastings said. “We rely on Solbrekk to provide technology support, and they do a great job of supporting our local network. Opening a new clinic, while supported by Solbrekk-Netgain, was effortless.”