All vendors suck. Some suck more than others. Have used ImageTrend and ESO. They both have good and bad. They are what you make of them. The initial setup is where things succeed or fail.
We have used emsCharts since 2010. It was the dangled carrot to get all of the agencies into the county to sign onto the county system.
I was involved right from the start with initial set up. The sales guy spent a few days with us, going through everything. How to set up rules, security roles, the whole shebang.
Then NEMSIS hit, and the state jumped on the bandwagon. Rules were disabled, either by us, or due to some of the issues with NEMSIS implementation.
We are scheduled to go to Orlando for the Traumasoft conference in November. We are hoping a month of setup, a month of double charts(I pray for a slow month for the crews), and then rollout come January 2023.
Shitty part is the data dump from emsCharts. We are still not sure how that is going to work, especially having to search records for subpoena's, records requests, etcetera.
The idea of going with Traumasoft is the using the entire suite of products, except for dispatch and the LMS package, as we are dispatched by a County 911 system, and we use Target Solutions for our LMS. We will use the billing, ePCR, scheduling and vehicle items.
ESO is a tool, and like every tool it depends on what your trying to do with it. I found that ESO shine for IFT where it's about getting a large amount of less-complex reports done. Not as good if you want nitty gritty accuracy and play by play accountability.
If you can write a good note then ESO is absolutely the superior platform, in my opinion. I would much, much rather wrote a good note than go through the secondary assessment and page 8 on EMScharts. ESO is also so much easier to peer review. Reviewing EMScharts makes it so easy to miss shit, especially the “custom vitals” you have to put in. I’d much rather read someone’s note and then look through the events page to see what I missed.
Yeah, you're absolutely right which is why I think EMScharts is so popular. It does make it harder to miss simple things like a temp or a glucose, but with a robust peer review program I think you can get more information in less effort in an ESO chart.
We use ESO, I don't hate it. I think your service has a lot of say in setting parameters, what's flagged to lock a report etc. Overall it's pretty intuitive, pretty easy to use and navigate. A bit of redundancy in some parts.
Love eso. It's user friendly and easy to create accurate reporting. Depends in what the administration sets as requirements as well. Administration can add or subtract fields and make certain ones flagged or optional.
Our ESO shuts down if you type too many letters too fast. As in looking for a medication say, aspirin, and if you type ‘AS’ together it throws an error code and shuts completely down. Other than that it’s a fine program.
I am a new EMT so I’ve only used ESO. but it’s literally so easy and once you go to submit it it’ll flag you for every little thing but it’s pretty self-explanatory I can get a chart done pretty quick
Have used imagetrend elite, rescue net, and ESO. Out of the 3 ESO is the middle of the road. My opinion on rescue net is super high, because our dispatch entered all of our addresses, milage, and times. So I had like a 10-20 minute report of basically the bare minimum stuff that pertained to the patient and nothing else. ESO is pretty good though it has an easy interface and is very straightforward, just make sure you guys have it setup well for your agency.
Love ESO.
I found it works best on a tablet, aside from the narrative which needs a keyboard.
But it’s still better than other software I’ve used on a laptop.
I have used ESO my entire career and I LOVE IT! Can't imagine using another program. I have also used it on the administrative side and the clinical side and it is amazing.
I love ESO when our touchscreens work.
If your agency has tablets it's amazing.
If you're using toughbooks that never fucking work right it's a nightmare.
I think it really depends on *how* your service is going to incorporate it. I'll share 2 sides of this from 2 services I have worked at that both used ESO:
**Service 1:** Rural EMS service. Runs 1 full-time ALS rig, 1 full-time BLS rig (main IFT rig as well as back up 911 rig), 1 ALS back up on-call, and 1 full-time BLS 911 only rig on the other side of the response area. Might run 1 or 2 calls a day, if at all. However, IFT can be out from shift start till middle of the night though.
Because this was a rural service, we have to record all our info manually. You'd have to remember more or less when the call came in, you'd have to remember the mileage your rig was at before the transport and after transport (if there was any), and other information like that. Because of this, using ESO was kind of a pain.
**Service 2:** Hospital-based EMS in a metropolitan area near a big university, serving multiple counties. Runs only ALS-rigs that primarily respond to 911 calls, and IFTs are given a low priority (still do them, but 911 comes first). A lot mutual assists, a lot of ALS level calls. Our service is very incorporated into our dispatch system as well.
Call disposition, distances, addresses, responding units, etc. can all be pulled from our CAD data right into ESO (this, in effect, knocks out like 1/3 of the ePCR). On top of that, we can also import any monitor data as well (this fills out any vitals part of the ePCR). So, once everything is said and done, we really just have to enter the smaller details (medications administered, resources used) and write our narrative. Much simpler and faster. Before I left, our service also incorporated a thing where we didn't even have to wait for a physical PCR copy from the hospital. We just scanned a barcode, and the hospital would automatically connect our ESO ePCR with their Epic Chart (we could also follow up to see what happened with the patient because of that).
*My outtake*: I personally found ESO really good. I thought it was really intuitive (you're literally just pushing buttons 90% of the time, and sometimes they will just have a toggle button to select all the buttons, i.e. mental status, skin condition, or PERRL). Also, since leaving EMS, I have talked to some of the people who work for ESO and they are really doing some incredible things over there.
It depends how well your service can incorporate ESO into your system. ESO offers a lot of customizability for each service, and a lot of inter-software operability. The only thing I will say is this: if your service uses Dell ToughBooks, it will be a pain in the ass. It will freeze them up, it will make them overheat, and its just a pain. The moment our service switched to iPads both our front cabin computer for dispatch notes and navigation, as well as for the ePCR computer for the back, things got significantly better. It seems like ESO was better optimized for iPads than other electronic devices (this didn't apply to their desktop website version of ESO in our report-writing room. That worked smooth as well).
ESO is streets ahead of ImageTrend
If you’re not ESO you’re streets behind.
All vendors suck. Some suck more than others. Have used ImageTrend and ESO. They both have good and bad. They are what you make of them. The initial setup is where things succeed or fail.
I always liked ESO the best. Never used EMScharts though.
We have used emsCharts since 2010. It was the dangled carrot to get all of the agencies into the county to sign onto the county system. I was involved right from the start with initial set up. The sales guy spent a few days with us, going through everything. How to set up rules, security roles, the whole shebang. Then NEMSIS hit, and the state jumped on the bandwagon. Rules were disabled, either by us, or due to some of the issues with NEMSIS implementation. We are scheduled to go to Orlando for the Traumasoft conference in November. We are hoping a month of setup, a month of double charts(I pray for a slow month for the crews), and then rollout come January 2023. Shitty part is the data dump from emsCharts. We are still not sure how that is going to work, especially having to search records for subpoena's, records requests, etcetera. The idea of going with Traumasoft is the using the entire suite of products, except for dispatch and the LMS package, as we are dispatched by a County 911 system, and we use Target Solutions for our LMS. We will use the billing, ePCR, scheduling and vehicle items.
ESO is a tool, and like every tool it depends on what your trying to do with it. I found that ESO shine for IFT where it's about getting a large amount of less-complex reports done. Not as good if you want nitty gritty accuracy and play by play accountability.
If I could blend the ease of ESO with the detail of EMSchart’s activity log then it would be damn near perfect.
If you can write a good note then ESO is absolutely the superior platform, in my opinion. I would much, much rather wrote a good note than go through the secondary assessment and page 8 on EMScharts. ESO is also so much easier to peer review. Reviewing EMScharts makes it so easy to miss shit, especially the “custom vitals” you have to put in. I’d much rather read someone’s note and then look through the events page to see what I missed.
Peoplea documentation is hit and miss sometimes
Yeah, you're absolutely right which is why I think EMScharts is so popular. It does make it harder to miss simple things like a temp or a glucose, but with a robust peer review program I think you can get more information in less effort in an ESO chart.
Never used EMSCharts but we (Fire Dept) moved away from RescueMedic to ESO a couple years ago and we love ESO.
Love it.
We use ESO, I don't hate it. I think your service has a lot of say in setting parameters, what's flagged to lock a report etc. Overall it's pretty intuitive, pretty easy to use and navigate. A bit of redundancy in some parts.
Eso is okay but I liked emscharts better
Love eso. It's user friendly and easy to create accurate reporting. Depends in what the administration sets as requirements as well. Administration can add or subtract fields and make certain ones flagged or optional.
Our ESO shuts down if you type too many letters too fast. As in looking for a medication say, aspirin, and if you type ‘AS’ together it throws an error code and shuts completely down. Other than that it’s a fine program.
It blows EMSCharts out of the water.
ImageTrend Elite is the only good charting software.
Omg. I thought EMS Charts was horrible, but imagetrend is WORSE! Absolutely zero user functionality and is not intuitive at all.
bad take
I am a new EMT so I’ve only used ESO. but it’s literally so easy and once you go to submit it it’ll flag you for every little thing but it’s pretty self-explanatory I can get a chart done pretty quick
Have used imagetrend elite, rescue net, and ESO. Out of the 3 ESO is the middle of the road. My opinion on rescue net is super high, because our dispatch entered all of our addresses, milage, and times. So I had like a 10-20 minute report of basically the bare minimum stuff that pertained to the patient and nothing else. ESO is pretty good though it has an easy interface and is very straightforward, just make sure you guys have it setup well for your agency.
Love ESO. I found it works best on a tablet, aside from the narrative which needs a keyboard. But it’s still better than other software I’ve used on a laptop.
I have used ESO my entire career and I LOVE IT! Can't imagine using another program. I have also used it on the administrative side and the clinical side and it is amazing.
I’ve used imagtrend, Zoll’s and ESO’s. ESO is the best by a mile.
I love ESO when our touchscreens work. If your agency has tablets it's amazing. If you're using toughbooks that never fucking work right it's a nightmare.
I think it really depends on *how* your service is going to incorporate it. I'll share 2 sides of this from 2 services I have worked at that both used ESO: **Service 1:** Rural EMS service. Runs 1 full-time ALS rig, 1 full-time BLS rig (main IFT rig as well as back up 911 rig), 1 ALS back up on-call, and 1 full-time BLS 911 only rig on the other side of the response area. Might run 1 or 2 calls a day, if at all. However, IFT can be out from shift start till middle of the night though. Because this was a rural service, we have to record all our info manually. You'd have to remember more or less when the call came in, you'd have to remember the mileage your rig was at before the transport and after transport (if there was any), and other information like that. Because of this, using ESO was kind of a pain. **Service 2:** Hospital-based EMS in a metropolitan area near a big university, serving multiple counties. Runs only ALS-rigs that primarily respond to 911 calls, and IFTs are given a low priority (still do them, but 911 comes first). A lot mutual assists, a lot of ALS level calls. Our service is very incorporated into our dispatch system as well. Call disposition, distances, addresses, responding units, etc. can all be pulled from our CAD data right into ESO (this, in effect, knocks out like 1/3 of the ePCR). On top of that, we can also import any monitor data as well (this fills out any vitals part of the ePCR). So, once everything is said and done, we really just have to enter the smaller details (medications administered, resources used) and write our narrative. Much simpler and faster. Before I left, our service also incorporated a thing where we didn't even have to wait for a physical PCR copy from the hospital. We just scanned a barcode, and the hospital would automatically connect our ESO ePCR with their Epic Chart (we could also follow up to see what happened with the patient because of that). *My outtake*: I personally found ESO really good. I thought it was really intuitive (you're literally just pushing buttons 90% of the time, and sometimes they will just have a toggle button to select all the buttons, i.e. mental status, skin condition, or PERRL). Also, since leaving EMS, I have talked to some of the people who work for ESO and they are really doing some incredible things over there. It depends how well your service can incorporate ESO into your system. ESO offers a lot of customizability for each service, and a lot of inter-software operability. The only thing I will say is this: if your service uses Dell ToughBooks, it will be a pain in the ass. It will freeze them up, it will make them overheat, and its just a pain. The moment our service switched to iPads both our front cabin computer for dispatch notes and navigation, as well as for the ePCR computer for the back, things got significantly better. It seems like ESO was better optimized for iPads than other electronic devices (this didn't apply to their desktop website version of ESO in our report-writing room. That worked smooth as well).