Jon,
I appreciate your information, but, I must say, I am skeptical. It all sounds good, but we have heard it before. We all know that "action speaks louder than words", and the Version 8 release has been disastrous for some users. This does not indicate enhanced quality testing. Breaking prior features seems particularly sloppy to me. So, Version 8 has been patched a couple of times already, with incomplete resolution of problems.
Why is AC spending time adding "coupons" and "patient education", rather than concentrating on basic problems in the software? They could stop adding these "features". Priorities are not aligned with user needs.
Gene,
I am trialing AC 8.2.4 on a stand alone computer at home to familiarize myself with its features and problems. Right now, I do not have a plan to use it in the office. I refuse to enter vaccine VIS information hundreds of times since V8 can no longer remember this information. Also, I depend on a wireless laptop for my exam rooms, so I am very concerned about the wireless speed issue.
I plan on manually converting ICD codes for now. I have my list of frequently used codes, and it is manageable. I don't use AC for billing.
Looking at AC 8 briefly, one irritant to me is that the ICD codes can no longer be modified, and whereas the diagnoses used to be in ALL CAPS, they are now formatted with a leading cap then lower case. All caps helped me to "highlight" the diagnoses to see them quickly in my notes. Since AC allows no other text formatting, having the diagnoses in caps was useful. It is also much easier to read on the screen for my aging eyes. Does a developer not using the program daily for charting even think about this issue? Perhaps this is nit-picky, but it is an example of something that just worked, which has now been eliminated. I like to modify the text of the codes to remove excess verbiage, and streamline my notes. We have all seen plenty of EMR notes with 10 pages of useless crap.
PLEASE bring back the ability to modify ICD codes, and capitalize the ICD codes.
