Beware The Hidden Costs Of A Poorly Constructed EHR Contract

Marla Durben Hirsch | Fierce EMR | April 10, 2014

We know that electronic health records can cost a lot of money, sometimes millions of dollars. So it would be pretty disconcerting for a provider to learn that it has to pay additional amounts on top of that initial layout. 

Yet evidently, this is not uncommon, and it's often because providers make mistakes when entering into a contract with an EHR vendor. There are all sorts of unexpected fees or other costs that can trip up even a savvy provider, as attorney Steven Fox, with Post & Schell in Washington D.C., pointed out in a recent webinar on the subject sponsored by the American Bar Association's Health Law Section.

Moreover, many of these money sinkholes aren't even due to nonnegotiable, unfair one-sided contract provisions. They're really more construction issues...