Healthcare IT News - August 2008 - (Page 22)

22 Healthcare IT News August 2008 ■ physiCiaN pRaCTiCes & amBUlaToRy CaRe The HCNN may also be used to notify physicians in the event of national public health emergencies or bio-terror events. The network is governed by the not-for-profit iHealth Alliance, with network operJack Lewin, MD ations provided by San-Francisco-based Medem, Inc. “We are thrilled to have ACOG and the ACC join this important national effort,” said Nancy Dickey, MD, former American Medical Association president and chair of the iHealth Alliance. “Our goal is to have all physicians subscribe to the HCNN by year’s end.” Lewin and ACOG executive vice president Ralph Hale, MD, said their organizations would assist their members in HCNN enrollment including e-mail outreach and pre-registration. “Getting important drug alerts to physicians is key to improving www.HealthcareITNews.com patient safety and keeping physicians well-informed,” said Hale. The HCNN is free to all licensed U.S. physicians and network organizers say it has been used solely for patient safety alerts, not for advertising or promotion. Physicians not enrolled in the HCNN will continue to receive alerts in paper via U.S. mail, typically a few weeks after online delivery via the HCNN. More at kaTRINa Continued from page 20 hcNN Continued from page 20 But while devastated three years ago, Coastal is in the midst of an impressive rebuilding effort. The CHC has opened three new permanent clinics in Biloxi, Bay St. Louis and Moss Point, and healthcare IT will play a significant role in each, and across the entire Coastal enterprise. “We lost up to 60,000 paper medical records due to the storm surge after Katrina,” said Chuck Clark, Coastal’s director of information systems. “We were completely reliant on our paper records, so we have to start over.” Last fall, the federal Health Resources and Services Administration awarded the CHC a $1,398,902 grant for a “High Impact” electronic medical record implementation project. Clark said Coastal has used the money to implement an integrated EMR system at all seven clinics. “We’re approximately 75 percent implemented,” Clark said. “The process should be complete by the end of September. Implementing an EMR is not really an IT project; it’s a medical staff project. You’re replacing a system that doctors are comfortable with, and you have to spend a lot of time with them.” Christine Maurice, Coastal’s EMR project manager and clinical staff coordinator, spends almost all of her time with the CHC’s medical staff. Maurice is responsible for EMR implementation at each clinic and provides training to physicians and staff members. She said it was challenging to convince physicians that an EMR would not slow down the care process. “Once our physicians understood how to navigate the EMR and use the system to their advantage, they were sold,” Maurice said. “I had to convince them that it was OK to take laptops into the examination room, but now they have the tools to improve time management and do proper documentation.” The EMR at Coastal cannot currently interface with IT systems at local hospitals, although Maurice indicated that was an important goal that the CHC intended to achieve. Coastal uses a HealthPort EMR and practice management system which includes clinical decision support tools, and chronic disease monitoring capabilities that Maurice says will greatly improve the healthcare provided to the vulnerable population that Coastal serves. “Our patients’ medical lives were destroyed by the storm,” she said. “The EMR gives patients a safety net and they really understand that. In our experience, the benefits so greatly outweigh the negatives.” ■ More at MD, chief executive officer of the ACC. “We are confident that cardiologists will enroll and immediately appreciate the benefits of the HCNN. This network can streamline care and save costs.” Multiple stakeholders joined together to develop the HCNN, which delivers online patient safety alerts that are product-related and mandated by the FDA. healthcareITNews.com e ●connect: HCNN 0808 optimi healthcareITNews.com e ●connect: katrINa 0808 http://www.HealthcareITNews.com http://HealthcareITNews.com http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=9695 http://HealthcareITNews.com http://www.healthcareitnews.com/story.cms?id=9693

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Healthcare IT News - August 2008 Contents Closer to IT Bill PHIN or RHIOs? Making Leaps After the Flood Tidal Change Denmark Bound Bridging the Divide Robot That Could Mobile Computing Data Everywhere

Healthcare IT News - August 2008

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