Cerner president Zane Burke said that the EHR vendor’s work with the U.S. Defense Department first go-live was successful and it’s on track for three subsequent pilots planned for this year.
“This project is making Cerner better, and I believe it ultimately benefits all our clients and is leading to enhanced implementation processes, advancements in cyber security, and sometimes connected technologies,” Burke said during an earnings call Thursday. “We remained very focused on continuing to deliver for the Department of Defense, which we believe will help prepare and position us for other opportunities.”
[Also: Allscripts, Cerner, Epic signal more open EHRs ahead]
CFO Marc Naughton explained that revenue for the first quarter of 2017 was $1.26 billion, up 11 percent over 2016, fueled by systems sales and services. Cerner’s first-quarter profit was $173.2 million, a 15 percent jump over the same period last year.
Burke pointed to population health and revenue cycle technologies specifically and attributed the growth to “multiple head-to-head wins against our primary competitor.”
Research firm Kalorama published a report on Thursday, EMR Market 2017: Electronic Medical Records in an Era of Disruption, that ranked Cerner as the market share leader followed by McKesson and Epic.
And when asked about the request for information that the Department of Veterans Affairs posted last week, Burke said that VA did so to get a better understanding of exactly what’s available in the commercial market.
“They have contracted with certain third parties to help do that review, and really make a determination as to whether they look at a commercially available off-the-shelf system, or COTS system, or stay with their Vista solution today. They could go back into – so, anything beyond that is speculation.”
[Also: Open source experts to VA: Keep VistA, it can be fixed]
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Email the writer: tom.sullivan@himssmedia.com