Note: This is an excerpt from an article originally published in HIT Consultant.

Few decisions are as important or as daunting as the one that leads to the implementation of a new EHR. When replacing best-of-breed clinical applications with an integrated EHR, a successful transition involves managing, not just technology but, equally as important, employees across multiple teams. The best and brightest in your organization are asked to focus on this initiative, but this new assignment leaves a gap in the maintenance and management of a healthcare organization’s legacy systems. Many legacy systems will be carried forward, some will remain and continue to need legacy support, and some will be allowed to retire. Whatever their destination, these legacy applications will need support for a certain amount of time.  

The care and feeding of legacy applications can cause issues in everyday IT operations. Staff can’t focus on more strategic, forward-moving initiatives when they are still tied up with the old. Maintaining these legacy applications leads to an increasing dependency on the limited number of staff who have such skills. This can increase risk at an operational level due to a potentially lowered skill pool. And as Jonas Knudsen of Health Insights has written, “When IT fails to deliver due to legacy and the lack of agility, the business model, and clinical processes become legacy as well.”

What should be done? One strategy to meet an organization’s’ IT staffing needs is to outsource resources from an external company.

Learn about the best practices in the management of legacy applications and benefits of outsourcing legacy application support reading the full article on HIT Consultant or by downloading our free whitepaper.