Cerner President Zane Burke said the company is continuing to push forward with a focus on overarching trends such as patient identification, population health – and an open philosophy to interoperability.
“It’s one thing to say it, it’s another thing to do it,” Burke said. “It takes significant focus to be both open and interoperable.”
Cerner is dedicating a chunk of the $700 million it spends for research and development on advancing the open approach, Burke said, by working with partners and enabling them to develop on top of Cerner software via APIs.
“I thought we took a major step with the announcement of CommonWell Health Alliance and Carequality,” Burke explained. “We’re going to do anything possible to move forward on interoperability. We view it as a moral obligation in our industry.”
Cerner is also increasing its focus on population health. The goal is to keep the person “at the center of everything we do in healthcare,” Burke said.
There are also significant investments going toward usability, revenue cycle management and population health.
“Usability is a really key element,” he said. “We’re asking clinicians to do more and more.”
Cerner is investing in revenue cycle across the entire continuum of care. And Burke sees a lot of promise.
“We have big investments across the continuum of care in the EMR – so think behavioral health, long-term care, skilled nursing, rehab, surgery centers,” Burke said. “All the care side is to be automated and tied.”
Cerner is at Booth 2161.
HIMSS17 runs from Feb. 19-23, 2017 at the Orange County Convention Center.
This article is part of our ongoing coverage of HIMSS17. Visit Destination HIMSS17 for previews, reporting live from the show floor and after the conference.