1. Identify your goals

It is so important to understand your business goals when looking for a behavioral health EHR. What are your overarching goals for your business and where are you going?  Are you trying to cut costs, grow revenue, expand locations, beds, occupancy or census? Are you trying to better retain staff? Do you have clinical goals that require better oversight or more time to accomplish - more efficiency, or better connection with patients? Identifying your goals, whatever they may be, is hypercritical to knowing what you want.  Pain is just as important which is the next step.

2. Identify your need: Why do you need a behavioral health EHR?

 It is critical to understand your motivations for needing a behavioral health EHR.  What is your challenge with your current software? What are general pains with your business?  Are you losing insurance dollars because of audits or record requests with missing documentation?  Are you struggling with licensing or other concerns? Is there a lack of oversight because you are on paper or a weak system with little reporting or business intelligence tools to get what you need? Is there a department that is inefficient?  Are you on a system but certain aspects of your business are still being done on paper?

3. Evaluate your current Process: What's working today that you wouldn't want to lose?

Is there anything your current vendor is doing right that you would be loath to lose? It is important to establish what is working and make sure you are not taking one step forward and two steps backward.

4. Assign priority

Try to list your pains with your current behavioral health EHR in order of biggest to least. Also, list the things you want to keep in order of importance. This will help you identify the best fitting EHR by how much value it will give you.

5. The Net

Your mental health EHR search needs to be done thoroughly.  Make sure you gather a minimum of two EHR providers to go through. Having three or four would be ideal.  Do an initial demo with each, keeping the demos to 30 minutes or less to narrow down to your top one or two.  

6. Due diligence: Getting References on the Behavioral Health EHR Provider

Make sure you speak to references.  This is an important step many people miss when selecting a behavioral health EHR.  Whether they blindly sign up with a company or whether they discount that company because another competing company discouraged them from continuing to talk with them, make sure you do your due diligence and speak with people that are actually using the software every single day. You should also check their reviews on sites like Capterra and G2Crowd. Look at how many reviews they have and if the majority are good or bad.

7. The Behavioral Health EHR Demo

 Make sure you have in mind some key areas you are looking to improve and have those outlined before the demo to help the presenter know what to focus on.  Your time is precious and it should be focused on the things that will bring you maximum value and enable you to maximize your results with your new software.  This will also help your behavioral health software provider to know the important things they need to be working on and where their customers are looking for help.

8. Your Current Contract

Some contracts have notice clauses that require one to give a certain amount of notice before you may cancel.  This is important to know when thinking about your timeline to transition. Timing your notice with your implementation is key so that you are not paying for two systems longer than you need to.  If your clause is 60 days or less, there isn’t much to worry about. Your new provider can advise you on when the best time will be to give notice. If it is longer than 60 days, you may want to consider giving notice even before you select a new partner.

9. A Good Fit

The partner you choose needs to be a good fit technically, but what about culturally?  Some partners might be more online-tutorial based, some may be support-center based, and others may be account management based.  It’s important to identify what is important to you and what is included. Also, where is the company headed? Most software today is cloud-based and delivered as a service (SAAS). What does their roadmap look like for the next year? How often do they do releases into their product? How are those communicated? How many engineers do they have on their team? Are they full time or part time contractors? Are they based in the US or overseas? This is important to know based on your past experience and deciding on the right fit for your business.

10. Cost vs. Value: What's the value of each option?

 Listing the choices in order, regardless of price, is a great way to help yourself determine what you really want.  Next, you'll want to assign a price to each option. If the price of the first one is worth the value it brings, then your decision was just made for you.  If there is a discrepancy, then you need to think a little harder. One suggestion that is worth trying is calling that number one option and telling them they are the number one option but that their price seems to still be a barrier.  Maybe they can be flexible. Sometimes they can and other times they can’t. It will depend on the situation. If option one cannot make it work, repeating these steps for option two and so forth will help you get the best possible solution for your needs and budget.

Choose a Behavioral Health EHR that best fits your needs

When you're looking for a behavioral health EHR, you should first identify your goals and needs. It doesn't matter how great a mental health EHR software is if it doesn't do what you need it to. Once you've established this, look at your current process and find an EHR that keeps what's currently working for you.

Next, assign priority to the pains and items you want to keep in order of importance. Then make a list of potential EHR vendors and get references on them. The best way to conduct an EHR search is to make it thorough. Then, get a demo! Most, if not all, EHR vendors provide a free demo. If they don't, you probably shouldn't consider that vendor. You can schedule a no-hassel demo with us here.

Check your current contract to ensure it doesn't have any clauses preventing you from leaving without sufficient notice. If you're able to leave your current contract, don't do so until you know the new vendor is a good fit technically and culturally. If it is going to save you time and give you peace of mind, it will be worth the switch.