This document summarizes news from the healthcare IT industry in August 1987 and discusses lessons that can be learned. It provides details on leading vendors of the time, including that only one vendor from 1987 still exists today under the same name and leadership. It also discusses people in the industry at that time, including earnings for various roles, and looks at advertisements from industry publications in 1987 for vendors and products, many of which are still in use today. The document concludes by previewing what will be covered from industry publications in September 1987.

1. 30 Years Ago In H.I.S.-tory
by Vince Ciotti
© 2017 H.I.S. Professionals, LLC, all rights reserved
News from
August
1987 and
lessons
for today

2. August 1987 in H.I.S.-tory
• Starting this month Mr. HIStalk has invited me to dig back into my
collection of early HIS documents and review the most interesting
happenings from 3 decades ago in our ever-changing HIS industry.
• Who cares? Well, I hope to point out some lessons we can learn
from these past events that may tell us what to expect among the
many constantly evolving leading vendors & products of today.
• My sources are as complex as our industry:
- PERIODICALS –pioneering print journals
founded by industry great Bill Childs.
- DATA BASES – created by Sheldon
Dorenfest, the research maven in H.I.S.
- FRIENDS – H.I.S. pioneers willing to share
embarrassing stories of their early days.
- MEMORIES – while I still have them…
Bill Childs
Sheldon
Dorenfest

3. Leading Vendors in 1987
• Dorenfest’s “Guide to the HIS Industry” listed these vendors as
the leaders based on a study of 3,078 hospitals over 100 beds:
• Recognize any of the names? The
small print is hard to read, but only
one vendor has survived to this day,
under the same name & C-suite..
• Granted, 30 years is a long time, but
which of today’s vendors will still be
around to be featured in a study like
this run by HIStalk Jr. in 2047?
• Interestingly the 2nd through 4th
vendors were all gobbled up by
McKesson, and are now part of
their EIS Division, up for sale…

4. People News
• Ironically in this month of Neal Patterson’s sad departure, Cerner
made the news 30 years ago when Cliff Illig was promoted to be
President & COO under him. A tribute to Cliff’s amazing longevity
at Cerner, and a sure sign of continuity there as Neal built such a
strong executive team that they should continue as the #1 vendor
for many more years. How many other of today’s vendors have a
#2 as solid as Cliff? For sure Carl Dvorak at Epic and Howard
Messing at Meditech are equally solid back-ups for Judy and Neil.

5. Read This Ad in Reverse?
• Excellent ad by the marketing
department at Saint, rightly
bragging of their impressive #s:
– 20 years of industry experience
– Over 240 hospital clients
– Parent Amex’s $14B in revenue
• So just how meaningful were
SAI’s impressive #s over time?
• Check out episode #20 on the
HIS-tory button our website
hispros.com for all the gory
details, but after a number of
M & As, they were bought by
HBOC, who sunset the Saint
system in favor of Paragon…

6. Earning$
in 1987
• Bill Sorkin was a superb recruiter and good friend who sadly
passed away a few years ago; he authored this fascinating article
on the typical earnings for HIS Professionals working in:
– Hospitals – there were no/few “CIOs” back then, so different titles:
• MIS Directors – usually reported to the CFO, made from $60K to $120K depending on size
• Managers – over Programming, Tech Services & Operations earned between $40K to $80K
• Analysts & Programmers – averaged from $25K to $65K, depending on hospital bed size
– Consultants – mainly the “Big Eight” back then, who earned the biggest $s:
• Partners – first year started between $90 & $135K, while veterans averaged $225K+
• Managers – earned $60K - $90K, based on salary & year-end bonus for sales/revenue
• Consultants – juniors started at $25K - $35K, while seniors earned from $35K to $45K
– Vendors – which I knew pretty well back then too and agree with Bill’s #s:
• Salesmen – started at $40-50K, salary & draw; make sales quote & they got $60-100K
• Sales Manager – base salary & draw ≈ $40-60K; if their reps delivered, up to $80-150K
• Sales & Marketing VP – a base salary &draw = $100-150K, in good year = $150K - $200K

7. CIO Earnings Today
• So how have CIO/MIS Directors salaries increased since 1987?
– Modern Healthcare publishes annual surveys of C-suite
remuneration; their 2015 survey gave these figures for CIOs:
• Hospitals (not IDNs) – 55 reporting hospitals’ CIO pay averaged $316K
• IDNs (multi-hospitals) – 174 reporting multis’ CIO pay averaged $440K
– CHIME published a more granular salary survey in 2012 with
many tables & charts analyzing CIO salaries by size & region:
• So overall, CIOs’ pay has grown almost as much as their workload…

8. Advertiser Index
• On the last page of the magazines is a list of
advertizing vendors so can look up yours if you
missed the ad. Most of these companies are gone,
but amazing how many of their products are still
being used in so many hospitals 30 years later:
– AMI/PHS – “AMI” was multi-hospital giant
American Medical International (not American
Medicorps Inc., SMS’ multi-client whose stock
index acronym was “AAM”), with an IT division
named “PHS” for Professional Healthcare
Systems. They developed a DG mini-based HIS
with solid financial systems called “PatCom,”
which was eventually bought by Keane, then
bought by NTT Data, who recently spun it off as
Cantata. PatCom still comprises the revenue
cycle core for their ≈200 hospital clients today.

9. Vendor Ads, cont’d
• Another long-lasting system advertised in August of
1987 and still running in many hospitals today:
– Health Data Sciences – “HDS” was founded in
1983 by Dr. Ralph Korpman, a Technicon/TDS
veteran, who developed “UltiCare,” one of the
pioneering mini-based HIS systems to offer CPOE
via bedside terminals. UltiCare sold very well,
and was bought & renamed a number of times:
• Medaphis, morphed into Per Se Technologies,
which re-named UltiCare as “Patient 1”
• Mysis acquired them, and renamed Patient 1
as the “Computerized Patient Record” or CPR
• QuadraMed came next, calling it “QCPR”
• Harris Healthcare is the latest owner, and
QCPR runs today in over 30 of their clients.

10. Vendor Ads, cont’d
• And the longest-lasting vendor advertised way then,
with some products from 1987 still running in
hospitals today after being acquired by Cerner:
– Shared Medical Systems – “SMS” was founded in
1969 and was the #1 HIS vendor by 1987 with a
wide variety of shared and inhouse products:
• No, not Invision, which wasn’t announced
until 1989, but rather its predecessor inhouse
Independence and shared FMS (Financial
Management System), SMS’ fancy new names
for IBM’s SHAS, the RCM which still runs very
well in hundreds of Invision sites today…
• Signature – SMS’ original physician billing
system which lacked any clinical components
but still crank out 1500 bills at some hospitals.

11. Next Month
• Some fascinating ads & articles from September 1987 HIS rags:
– Reports from the 2 big annual HIS industry conventions,
neither of which and were sponsored by “HIMSS”!
– Articles and ads for several vendors back then that are still
running in hundreds of hospitals 30 years later…
– Review of “Big Blue,” which ruled the IT industry for many
decades; might it foretell the future of Microsoft & Apple?
– “CIO, VP of MIS, MIS Director, DP Manager – Who Cares?” –
you might when you read about this articles forecast…
• Hope you enjoy jumping back to these early days of HIS-tory –
glad to share any of your memories or feedback –
Vince Ciotti HIS Professionals, LLC
505.466.4958 vciotti@hispros.com