Gantry: Why did you feel this was the right time to release a mobile charge capture solution?

Ying: Originally, our core product focused only on mobile clinical data delivery. With over 200 hospitals using MData today, MercuryMD has the largest penetration of hospitals in the industry, and this market is growing rapidly. In 2003, an estimated 419 U.S. hospitals had mobile healthcare solutions operational within their enterprise, and the market for these systems is projected to grow significantly to include 2,047 hospitals by 2007.

With MData fully entrenched in the market, MercuryMD is now releasing MData Charge Capture. This new product was released the first quarter of 2005, with general availability planned for second quarter 2005.

Gantry: What were the critical design goals for MData? What problems were you trying to solve for your target market?

Ying: Hospitals spend the money on the mobile healthcare solutions. The overriding need of hospitals is to satisfy their physician networks. Physicians select which hospitals and clinics they wish to be affiliated with. In turn, the physicians drive the patient flow to those hospitals. The goal is to make the process of getting clinical data and performing charge capture simple.

MercuryMD had mobile clinical data down. We needed to make mobile charge capture equally easy to use. To achieve high physician adoption, we needed to provide high value for the investment, measured in physician time and real estate on the handheld. Basically, our motto was "keep it simple!"

Gantry: Rumor has it that physicians do not readily adopt handhelds and mobile charge capture solutions into their daily routines. What has been MercuryMD's experience?

Ying: Try an MData demo! You'll see bigger buttons, bigger font, an intuitive user interface and screen layout. MData supports access to data via infrared, wireless, and cellular networks. MData is also flexible, supporting both Palm OS and Pocket PC handhelds. Make the solution easy to use, and people will use it.

Over 10% of our user base is comprised of physicians who don't use a computer and don't do email. The excuse that doctors have trouble with computers and software solutions because they're technophobes is a cop out. Physicians care about time.

Poor solution design means that it takes more time to use the solution. As a physician, more time spent dealing with difficult technology means that I see fewer patients. As a result, I stop using the solution. If I gain more time, I use the solutions. It's not the technology; it's not the doctors. It's the design of the mobile applications that make the difference in provider adoption. Usability is the key.

Gantry: What value do you believe MData brings to physicians?

Ying: MData makes physicians' professional lives easier. For example, let's say a physician gets paged about a patient in the hospital. Normally, the physician would need to sit on the phone while the nurse fetches and reads lab results, patient data, meds, etc. The alternative is for the physician to go home and log on to the Internet. This takes 30 minutes at least.