MMRGlobal, Inc. (fka MMRF)

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Let's Hear It For Faxes

eFax in Hospitals
Jan 23, 2014 04:44 pm | By: John

Over the years, I’ve had the chance to interact with basically all of the major eFax services out there. I’ve even had a number of them as advertisers. This largely makes sense since healthcare it still the haven for fax. I won’t go into all the reasons why fax is still so popular in healthcare, but it’s still the most trusted form of interoperability in healthcare. As an eFax vendor pointed out to me, fax is great because it produces an unalterable document. Sure, it’s not impossible to alter, but it’s pretty difficult.

I am hopeful that fax will one day be replaced by true interoperability in healthcare. Although, I’m more hopeful that Direct Project will get us there even sooner. Fore those not familiar with Direct Project, it’s like fax, but with meta data attached to it and securely sent over the internet. Both true interoperability of data and Direct Project still have a long ways to go though. So, don’t hold your breathe on those taking out fax….yet.

A trend I have seen happening is organization replacing their current fax solution with some sort of eFax option. In many cases this shift has been driven by issues with fax when you’re in a VoIP environment. Yes, I know that many of the VoIP environments can support fax, but it takes work. In fact, it takes just as much work getting it to function as it is to just implement some sort of eFax solution.

The other real benefit I’ve seen many consider when looking at eFax is the cost structure of eFax. Instead of having to invest in faxing hardware all up front, many organizations like that the eFax can be bought on a pay as you go or usage based plan. If indeed faxing is starting to go away in favor of some other electronic transfer of data, then your organization can save money on faxing as your fax load is reduced.

There are a few trends I’ve seen with eFax in healthcare. What trends have you been seeing in your organization?

http://www.hospitalemrandehr.com/2014/01/23/efax-in-hospitals/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HospitalEMRandEHR+%28Hospital+EMR+and+EHR%29

Related posts:

1. Software to Software Interoperability and Software to Device Interoperability
2. We Have an HIE – The Internet
3. 2013 Hospital EHR and Health IT Trends