As healthcare professionals continue to seek administrative efficiencies and savings, the market for financial IT systems in physician offices is expected to pass $6 billion by 2013, new research suggests.
Research and Markets, a Dublin-based research firm, predicts in a new report that the current $3.5 billion market for the systems could hit $6.22 billion over five years.
The report, titled Physician Office Financial Systems - Market Opportunities, Strategies, and Forecasts, 2007 to 2013, says that the systems are growing in popularity as practices realize efficiencies by automating time-consuming manual processes.
Dashboard systems that give clinicians a view of their financial processes are emerging as a desirable business process management tool for physician practices, according to a release outlining the report. "Gaining a real-time view into relevant practice information gives physicians, managers and administrators the information they need to make better decisions regarding both patient care and profitability," the release said.
Additionally, the markets for physician information software licensing and supply chain automation are growing in step with increasing physician practice IT implementations and e-commerce.
"Medical practices businesses today face a serious and widening information 'Integration Gap' between system integration demands and their ability to meet these demands," the release said.
The report also notes that processes like hand coding are cheaper than IT implementations in the short term, and packaged applications are efficient in completing functions needed for pre-integration processes such as brokering and adapting.