Long Term Care Software Vendors: Which is Right for You?
Long term care software automates the operations of nursing homes, SNFs, and other long term care facilities. Traditional paper documentation with handwritten, manual entries was often inaccurate and illegible, resulting in medical errors and excessive paperwork. This became a driving force to establish nursing home management software that could incorporate multiple functions, thus improving the efficiency and workflow in long term care facilities.
Of course, as with all new product development, the initial phase of long term care EMR software included some design flaws, and systems often proved to be inflexible, limited, or unable to meet the needs of customers. A report by the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association highlighted the voices of nurses frustrated with EHRs and the failure to deliver on what caretakers needed from their software.
Modern long term care software vendors have managed the backlash of negative opinions by giving healthcare providers a voice. Forward-thinking companies, like Experience Care (more below) invested time into documenting feedback and incorporating it into its updates. This, in turn, enables them to provide a better product tailored to the client’s needs and to achieve greater customer satisfaction from nurses who use the software daily.
The task now for long term care EHR software companies is to continue increasing the accuracy of documentation while reducing administration duties to improve workflow efficiency. Below, we have highlighted some key long term care software vendors in the current marketplace.
Compare the features between different healthcare vendors.
1. Experience Care’s NetSolutions
Net Solutions provides efficient long term care software solutions to post-acute and long-term care facilities.
This nursing home software is user-friendly and customizable, with proven results from CNAs and nurses who have embraced this long term care software system as part of their daily routines.
Products offered include:
- General Financials:The long term care software streamlines all financial processes for SNFs by seamlessly integrating workflows, billing, and financial statements into the existing software structures. They also offer a value-based pricing system, or, the option to pay only in accordance with the beds that are filled. This can save a facility $25 a month per resident.
- Revenue Cycle Management: RCM software maximizes reimbursements for nursing homes by optimizing cash flows, thus allowing the nursing home staff to focus more on resident care
- Hospital and Physician Referral Portal: This referral portal helps streamline the referral process of patients from hospitals to SNFs. Data is transferred electronically between a hospital’s EHR directly to a long term care facility’s EHR system. This improves communication between healthcare providers.
Experience Care prides itself on its configurable and user-friendly long term care EHR software. Having an engaging dashboard and a patient-centered Kardex allows users to pull resident data quickly and easily, thus improving efficiency.
The long term care software also provides exceptional user support with dedicated client service representatives located throughout the U.S. working in all time zones from 5 A.M. Eastern to 8 P.M. Eastern. This means real human interactions with the support team rather than an automated telephone service, thus resulting in faster response times and better customer care. There is also a customer service log that is checked nightly to ensure all voicemails and emails are documented and handled accordingly.
Another differentiating element is Experience Care’s innovative, customer-driven products that are the product of monthly user meetings with the CEO, COO, and other industry leaders. These sessions allow the Experience Care team to listen to client suggestions and concerns so that they can execute beta version updates to the senior living software and its features. This engaging approach has resulted in high customer satisfaction and innovative new features, like the electronic Kardex , a Fixed Assets module, and the new CareMetrics analytics tool .
Pros of Experience Care’s NetSolutions
- Around the clock, personalized customer support with quick response times
- Easily customizable with different modules to fit various business need
- Free training for nursing staff on how to use EHR software
- User-friendly interface in accordance with the most modern UX design
- High levels of data privacy
- Option to choose between cloud-based storage or on-site facility data storage
- Enabled third-party integrations
- Access to raw data and ability export to Excel, PDF, and in other formats
- Built-in electronic Kardex at no additional cost
- Value-based pricing through the Patient Per Day (PPD) system
Experience Care provide around the clock, personalized customer support, and customizable modules to fit various business needs.
Cons of Experience Care’s NetSolutions
- No free version
- No free trial
2. PointClickCare
PointClickCare offers assisted living management software solutions.
Between 2011-2012, PointClickCare’s long term care EHR software went through a major overhaul, with improvements in their reporting functions. Still, their software still lacks the strong customizable features of the EHRs of other long term care software vendors, like Experience Care, and despite their best efforts to refine their software updates by building upon the current features, they lag in new and innovative ideas.
While PointClickCare’s software is still a popular choice in long term care, it costs more than similar software, as PCC charges additional fees for supplementary features and services, such as access to raw data. Their data exporting function is also somewhat limited; facilities can only export in PDF format.
PointClickCare also has an open forum, Pulse, where users can log in to ask general questions about the products and their features. This useful function allows users to share information and first-hand experiences about using the product. However, should any serious problems occur, users will need to escalate the problem to a higher tier and contact their customer support line, which is known to be inefficient and slow. It often takes three to four days to escalate problems to higher tier levels. Furthermore, PCC technicians do not offer the guidance or support expected, often offering nothing more than obvious information and ideas that the user will have already explored.
PointClickCare products include:
- Skilled nursing core platform – A cloud-based platform that offers an end-to-end toolset providing solutions for care delivery, coordination, business intelligence, and financial management. This integrated approach allows users to connect care services, billing, and administrative processes across a single platform, giving users a real-time view of their entire operation.
- Senior living core platform – This allows users to use integrated tools to meet the care and expectations of residents and their families. The mobile tools can be used simultaneously with non-clinical environments while tracking and charting care delivery services.
- Home health care platform – A mobile-integrated care delivery management system that connects agency services from care planning and scheduling to billing and reporting.
Pros of PointClickCare
- Open forum to share information with other users
- Compatible with iOS devices (iPhone and iPad)
- Allows for multiple integrations
- In-person training plus webinars and documentation
Cons of PointClickCare
- Not user-friendly, as users must open multiple screens to assess information
- No free trial
- Cloud-based data can be easily compromised
- Limited financial reporting capabilities
- Not compatible with Android devices
- Slow customer support response times
- Limited customization on varying business needs
- Surcharge on supplementary services and features
- Limited dashboard capabilities
- No available training courses
- System tends to run slowly and freeze, especially in the afternoons
- Inconvenient password reset process
- Difficulty linking with other software programs or uploading lab results
PointClickCare users may grow frustrated from opening multiple screens to access the information they need.
3. MatrixCare Skilled Nursing Software
MatrixCare provides post-acute EHR software for facility-based settings.
Products offered include:
- Life Plan Community Software – A cloud-based, integrated software to simplify administration for clinical, financial, and operational tasks. All care setting information is stored in a single record so users can view it on a desktop or mobile device. This nursing home software product is commonly found in senior living and skilled nursing facilities.
- Care Network Solution This includes all out-of-hospital care services , such as home health, hospice, palliative, and private duty care. It is a cloud-based software that is compatible with iOS and Android devices to maximize patient management. This nursing home charting software allows easy flow of information between physicians, case managers/discharge planners, and organizations to provide better care for patients.
- Care Community Management – Users have access to all medical providers, so hospitals and ACOs can monitor the quality of care, even after residents are discharged. This useful feature allows doctors to monitor changes in their patient’s condition across the continuum of care and intervene if necessary.
Pros of MatrixCare
- No setup fee
- 24/7 support
- All data is backed-up in the cloud
- Compatible with iOS and Android devices
Cons of MatrixCare
- No free trial
- Has a per-user pricing model, which may be costly for large facilities
- No offline version
- Lacks the ability to scan paper records direc tly into the patient chart, instead forcing users to go through many steps
- Logs users out frequently, cutting down on efficiency
- Running reports is difficult, as search criteria must be reset each time
- Not easy to use on tablets
- Limited customization options
MatrixCare has a per-user pricing model, which may be costly for large facilities.
4. Netsmart
Netsmart is an IT partner for various healthcare providers and organizations.
Some of the products offered by Netsmart include:
- EMR/EHR– This feature offers workflow and functionality through their key component, the CareFabric platform. The platform is integrated to transfer information across communities to ensure collaboration and communication between providers is smooth and efficient.
- Care Plan Management – The software allows users to track services and treatments for individuals across different care settings while reducing duplicate services and simplifying care transitions with secure data transfers. The integrated care coordination management also allows facilities to connect with external providers so that lab results, HIE information, and other data are incorporated into the workflow and treatment plans for residents
- Managed Care Organizations (MCOs) – This is a web-based integration that helps to reduce fraud, waste, and abuse. It is connected with over one hundred electronic health records (EHR) and electronic visit verification (EVV) apps checking for compliance with authorizations, verifying regulatory compliance, and analyzing service deliveries without any manual reporting.
Pros of Netsmart
- Compatibility and support with Android and iOS devices
- Chat support
- HIPAA compliant
Cons of Netsmart
- No on-premise offline installation
- No free version
- No free trial available
- High amount of glitches
- Difficult to navigate between Back Office and Clinical
- Functions and points of entry do not always match, creating duplication in workflows
- Wrong names of physicians or clinicians on some orders
- Support team lacks proper training, meaning multiple calls must be made to resolve issues
- Small screen fonts
- Difficult to run specific reports
Netsmart is known to be difficult to navigate between the back office and clinical departments.
5. American HealthTech
American HealthTech allows for an end-to-end EHR with integrated RCM (Revenue Cycle Management) tools
American HealthTech software solutions include:
- Care Management – A web-based AHT (a fully-featured Assisted Living Software) designed to give users a complete, real-time view of resident information. It supports physician mobility from mobile devices with functions that include e-signing, smart charting (point of care), ePrescribing, and supply tracking to ensure payments are properly recorded.
- Financial and Enterprise Management – This is used in conjunction with the Revenue Cycle Management (RCM). It controls all cash and cost transactions that are configured with workflows, accounts payable, and the 3R management suite to ensure staff is compensated accordingly.
- Revenue Cycle Management – This tool helps to manage a healthcare provider’s revenue cycle, from admissions and eligibility verification to claims submission and processing. Key functions include: admissions analysis, eligibility verification for admissions and billing workflows, and accounts receivable to maximize cash flow.
Pros of American HealthTech
- 24/7 live-rep customer support
- Chat support
- Essential data is backed-up in the cloud
- Compatible with Windows software
- In-person training and webinars are available
Cons of American HealthTech
- Web-based only, therefore it requires constant internet connection
- Has a per-user pricing model, which may be costly for large facilities
- No free-trial
- High number of glitches and bugs
American HealthTech is web-based only software and requires constant internet connection.
Choosing Between Long Term Care Software Vendors
When choosing between different nursing home software options and long term care software vendors, facilities must decide which meets their individual needs while balancing cost-effective practices. Some long term care acute providers, like Cerner and Epic , provide software solutions and products. However, the National Library of Medicine notes that these EHRs are challenged by making electronic data usable , interoperable, and compatible with the patient-driven payment model that is used in many facilities. To this day, there are still many barriers that need to be addressed, such as physician dissatisfaction with EHRs, overregulation, and cost.
While healthcare providers acknowledge there is a need for change, it is up to the software providers to adapt their software models and features to meet the current requirements of facilities. With each passing day, more healthcare staff are accepting the use of EHR technology. That means that, to accommodate this shift and the broader acceptance of nursing computer software, your facility will need to provide sufficient training and refresher training courses for all staff members who use long term care software. Only then can facilities maximize their long term care software, when all staff members are knowledgeable enough to address and resolve software problems as they occur.