Caduceus Says Cloud Computing Here to Stay for Medical Office Applications

Caduceus Software Systems Corp. has announced that its Caduceus MMS version 1.0, an all-in-one software solution that medical offices can use to manage patient bookings, Electronic Health Records, (EHRs), and process billing, will soon be available “in the cloud,” according to a company press release.

The press release notes that The Economist writes that it “makes sense to put health records into the cloud” to help medical staff “retrieve and manipulate data remotely, over the Internet.”

Caduceus MMS installs onto office computer terminals and can be accessed within a private company network. What the company is looking at is the ability “to place the software in a ‘cloud’ platform, which means that the software is not installed on the private network, but rather installed on a dedicated server on the Internet,” according to the press release.

The press release points out that the advantages of this solution include the fact that the software will be hosted elsewhere and the uptime and the monitoring of the software would be easier, allowing users  to get access to the data real-time while not requiring them to be physically present at the office to diagnose computer problems.

In addition, trouble-shooting becomes easier as the software is hosted on certified machinery and complies with the client’s software and hardware requirements.

The press release notes that with cloud computing, customers can connect to the server with any hardware they wish, eliminating the need to upgrade entire office systems to use the software.

Kal K. Korff at scribd.com says that cloud computing is a “real paradigm shift away from long-standing IT practices” and could be a “game-changer.” mntfhnx"

But The Economist notes that technology experts at Gartner say that “tech firms are rushing to rebrand their products with the latest ‘cloud’ buzzword, whether they actually are cloud offerings or not.”

“The danger is that America’s health services have foisted upon them whatever the industry has to sell, rather than what is needed,” the article at The Economist reports.

So, is it in the clouds for us? Guess we’ll have to wait and see.