Troy, MI-based gloStream calls itself the Microsoft Office of medical practice software. Yet in addition to emulating the business strategy behind Microsoft’s dominant desktop applications franchise, gloStream has actually built its software for doctors’ offices on the Redmond, WA-based software giant’s (NASDAQ:[[ticker:MSFT]]) technology.
There are thousands of companies that embed Microsoft technology into their software—and many that do this for healthcare applications. Yet I’m having trouble finding an electronic medical records provider whose fortunes are as extensively tied to Redmond as gloStream’s. A doctor can only buy the firm’s software from Microsoft resellers and partners, Mike Sappington, the firm’s CEO, says. And built on Microsoft Office, the company’s EMR and practice management software actually have Microsoft Word embedded in them.
GloStream certainly isn’t the first tech firm to hitch itself to Microsoft. The software behemoth owes much of its success to a network of thousands of companies that build applications on Microsoft technology platforms or provide sales and IT support of Microsoft products. But gloStream’s part in this network is worth noting because the firm is providing a way for Microsoft partners to become involved in a major surge in technology adoption among U.S. physicians.
The vast majority of doctors in this country rely on paper-based records to store and manage patient data. The federal stimulus last year included $19 billion to help spur adoption of electronic health records systems among physicians and hospitals. While the stimulus subsidizes doctors’ purchases of the software, the money itself doesn’t solve some bugaboos that have caused doctors to balk at electronic health records in the past. For one, the software can pose challenges to staff members who need to learn how to use it, and it can interrupt an office’s workflow, Sappington says. And doctors themselves are obviously busy people, who didn’t go to medical school because they wanted to spend a lot of time learning how to use new software that isn’t intuitive.
At gloStream, he says, the firm wanted to build easy-to-use software based on Microsoft Office, with which millions of people are already quite familiar. And the five-year-old company decided early on that it would use the thousands of Microsoft partners around the country to sell and support its technology rather than trying to do these things on its own. The firm also believes its strategy allows it to benefit from the billions of dollars that Microsoft spends on Office-related research and development, Sappington says.
The firm says that it is the only provider of EMRs and practice management software that has
