Management Health Solutions, the Fairfield, Conn.-based provider of clinical inventory solutions, has announced its acquisition of AtPar Inc., a developer of mobile supply chain software. The acquisition advances MHS’s clinical inventory management solution and is the organization’s next step in helping hospitals curb the rising cost of healthcare through innovative clinical materials management processes. AtPar’s mobile technology complements MHS’s Optimal Inventory Control – the company’s tested process of counting, content maintenance and optimizing a hospital’s clinical materials inventory. Further, the acquisition increases the number of hospitals it serves by more than 200 providers, bringing the company’s total partnerships to nearly 500 in approximately 30 states.
PayneCrest Electric and Communications, of St. Louis, has completed an $8 million electrical design and installation project for the new primary data center of BJC HealthCare. Built to LEED standards, the 40,000-square-foot Tier III data center is located on BJC’s 48-acre Progress West HealthCare Center campus in O’Fallon, Mo. It hosts patient and billing records for the entire healthcare organization, consisting of 13 hospitals and more than 100 healthcare sites in Missouri and Illinois.
Canyon Park Clinic, Pacific Medical Center’s new multi-specialty clinic in Bothell, WA, announced that it will host Clinic Workflow Automation from Versus Technology, Inc. when it opens later this month. The Clinic Workflow Automation solution is based on Versus’ real-time locating system (RTLS), Versus Advantages. By keying off of location data collected through the RTLS, Versus Advantages identifies current locations of patients and resources, patient status, and room status. As each data point is time stamped, Versus can deliver reports regarding overall Length of Stay (LOS) or how long it takes to complete each individual stage of care, such as Nurse Assessment. Advantages also displays other key indicators such as whether lab or imaging services are required or whether the patient is new or existing.
Innovative Routines International (IRI), of Melbourne, Fla., has released the world’s first cross-platform, data-centric protection utility for files. FieldShield protects personally identifying information (PII) in flat files down to the field level, according to business rules. FieldShield’s protections include AES-256 and custom encryption (decryption), masking via anonymization or pseudonymization, de- and re-identification, filtering and redaction. Protection and formatting functions defined in simple job scripts allow FieldShield users to mask fields based on the nature of the data and its destination(s). One concealment job can produce one output safe for multiple recipients, where each runs their own FieldShield job to reveal only the entitled data elements. This saves job design and execution time, and avoids data synchronization issues.
Viztek, the Garner, N.C.-based radiology solution provider, has installed a complete digital imaging solution at Carolina Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine Center, P.A. of Gastonia, N.C. A Viztek U-Arm DR was installed complete with the patented stitching feature, stitching stand and the weight-bearing stand. Additionally Viztek installed its Opal-ORTHO PACS designed specifically for the orthopedic market with full templating capabilities and the Smart Card quickswipe for fast HIPAA-compliant log-in and -out with a wave of a card. The multi-specialty orthopedic group with six physicians and two physician assistants previously had two x-ray rooms. It transitioned to a digital environment with Viztek’s U-Arm DR in one room and a CR unit in the secondary room.
NextGen Healthcare Information Systems, of Atlanta, a wholly owned subsidiary of Quality Systems, Inc. and a leading provider of healthcare information systems and connectivity solutions, has announced an agreement with Mercy Health System (MHS) to deploy NextGen EHR (Electronic Health Record) and NextGen Health Information Exchange (HIE). The largest Catholic healthcare system serving the Delaware Valley, MHS has been using NextGen Practice Management for nearly four years.
A-Life Medical, the San Diego-based provider of computer-assisted coding (CAC) products and services to the healthcare industry, announced that A-Life Hospital, its wholly owned subsidiary, has entered into an agreement with OhioHealth, a Columbus, Ohio-based hospital system. Under the multi-year agreement, A-Life Hospital will provide facility outpatient-based CAC services to OhioHealth, with the intention to evaluate possible expansion into inpatient and professional coding services as well. OhioHealth will now deploy A-Life’s pioneering CAC technology across five of their facilities, which include three Columbus-based hospitals: Riverside Methodist Hospital; Grant Memorial Hospital and Doctor’s Hospital, as well as Dublin Methodist Hospital in Dublin and Grady Hospital in Delaware.
Main Line Health (MLH), a non-profit health system serving portions of Philadelphia and its western suburbs, has awarded a contract to SunGard Availability Services to provide managed services for its primary data center. SunGard will also deliver remote managed IT services across Main Line Health’s four acute care hospitals - Bryn Mawr, Lankenau, Paoli and Riddle - as well as Bryn Mawr Rehab Hospital and 21 other locations. Main Line Health expects to improve operational efficiencies by having SunGard manage its IT infrastructure, enabling Main Line Health IT staff to focus more fully on its top priority which is delivering clinical data to the point of care.
Streamline Health Solutions, of Cincinnati, a leading provider of document workflow solutions for hospitals, has announced that East Orange General Hospital in East Orange, N.J., will implement Streamline Health's document workflow solutions integrated with GE Centricity Enterprise clinical information solution. Through this integrated solution, East Orange General Hospital looks to enhance their health information management processes, boost productivity and ultimately, improve patient care. Additionally, East Orange General Hospital will utilize Streamline Health's remote hosting center located in Cincinnati, Ohio, to facilitate the implementation and management of workflow solutions for improving the efficiency of key Health Information Management processes.
Carestream Health, of Rochester, N.Y., has announced that Memorial Hospital of York, Pa., has purchased all three products in its innovative portfolio of imaging systems based on its wireless, cassette-size DRX-1 detector: the CARESTREAM DRX-1 System, the CARESTREAM DRX-Evolution and the CARESTREAM DRX-Mobile Retrofit Kit. For added flexibility and cost efficiency, the lightweight, removable detectors used in a room-based system can be deployed in the mobile system as well. These systems deliver exceptional staff productivity and help enhance patient care, while simultaneously equipping facilities to reduce equipment expenses.
Saint Michael’s Medical Center in Newark, N.J. has turned to IBM for real-time tracking of medical equipment to ensure that life saving medical devices are instantly available and expertly maintained. Saint Michael's is using IBM’s Real-Time Location Services (RTLS) software and ultrasound RTLS infrastructure from Sonitor Technologies to automatically track equipment, alert staff when the required level of equipment is running low, and to ensure compliance with patient safety regulations. The use of smart automatic tracking systems in hospitals helps eliminate inefficiency, improve patient safety and save hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost and under-utilized equipment. It also prevents the need for caregivers to spend valuable patient care time looking for the equipment they need.
Pharmacy OneSource, of Bellevue, Wash., a software-as-a-service provider to more than 1,300 hospitals in the United States, announced several new improvements have been added to Sentri7, a web-based, enterprise-wide electronic surveillance application that helps hospital staff identify at-risk patients. Infection prevention teams now have access to the positive culture line list, a highly-tailored dashboard specific to the workflow of infection control activities. This list view displays all positive cultures within a specified time range, including culture type, location history, admit/spec/resulted dates, and positive culture findings. Single-click documentation of hospital-acquired infection discovery is included. Sentri7 can also pull data from radiology and surgery feeds to make further assessments for patient safety. For example, surveillance of chest x-ray impressions can expedite positive determination of pneumonia by infection preventionists and pharmacists.
Anakam, of San Diego, announced that HEALTHeLINK, the Western New York Clinical Information Exchange, based in Buffalo, N.Y., has selected the Anakam Identity Suite to provide access to the private health information of the more than 1.5 million patients in the community. HEALTHeLINK has implemented the Anakam Identity Suite to provide service to its community providing a ubiquitous, cost-effective mechanism for the strong authentication and more secure online transactions for physicians accessing the private information of patients. This service will enable a single two factor authentication method enabling secure access to HEALTHeLINK and others in the community including hospital systems and health insurance plans through a single platform – simplifying the physician’s experience.
SeeMyRadiology.com, the new medical image cloud computing service from Atlanta-based AccelaRAD, has announced that three organizations -- Diagnostic Imaging Specialists in Atlanta, Ga., Coastal MRI in Port Royal, S.C. and South County Imaging in St. Louis, Mo. -- have selected SeeMyRadiology.com as a strategy to improve medical image exchange with outside imaging facilities and physicians.
Patient Care Technology Systems (PCTS), a subsidiary of Consulier Engineering Inc., and VIXIA North America have announced that Mission Hospital has selected VIXIA to provide their managed, on-site Equipment Distribution services. As part of VIXIA’s service, they will deploy a Real Time Location System (RTLS) and their VixPort information portal, which was co-developed by PCTS and VIXIA to more effectively manage movable medical equipment assets. VixPort, built on the PCTS Amelior 360 technology platform, also provides an interface for Temperature Monitoring and key interfaces to other software modules designed to improve patient-care and efficiency in a variety of other clinical processes.
