A new trend in using software-as-a-service, or SaaS, can not only help healthcare facilities save money on their software applications, but it can help free up information technology specialists to focus on building the business, according to a new white paper released by PointClickCare.
Minneapolis-based PointClickCare serves some 3,000 long-term care facilities in 40 U.S. states and across Canada. According to Mike Wessinger, CEO of PointClickCare, with SaaS,
nursing homes don't have to buy, install or maintain expensive hardware or software, and they don't have to chase upgrades. They merely pay a monthly fee and receive the service like a utility.
Murry Mercier, vice president and director of information services at HCR Manor Care and co-author of the paper, said margins are much slimmer for nursing homes than for hospitals, so it was important to him to find the most IT value for the lowest cost.
Mercier said another plus his organization received by using SaaS, was streamlined and timely implementation of new healthcare IT. HCR's 280 facilities met their 18-month implementation deadline with no trouble. "We're not a technology company, we're a healthcare company," Mercier said. "By leaving all the software and hardware in PointClickCare's hands, we were able to focus on our operations and the rollout process."
According to Gartner, a global IT research firm, organizations usually spend up to four times the initial cost of IT to manage their software after they buy it. Some companies spend more than 75 percent of their total IT budget on maintaining and running existing systems and software infrastructure.
Through economies of scale, a SaaS vendor can maintain a system at a much lower cost, freeing up providers to spread their IT budget across many more applications to support and grow their business operations, according to white paper published by the Software-as-a-Service Executive Council.
Wessinger said the advent of improved bandwidth has contributed to making SaaS a more viable option and a growing trend, though some IT departments are still wary of it.
"In a nutshell, a lot of IT shops are threatened by SaaS. They wonder if they will be out of a job," Wessinger said. "The reality is, that will happen only if an organization doesn't really understand how to get the most from SaaS. Instead of the IT department getting bogged down in the mud with commodity hardware applications and management, SaaS can help it focus on what drives business."