MEDecision Forms Interoperability Competency Center to Advance an Open Technology Platform for Health Information Exchange
Group Will Pursue Open Technology Standards, Eliminate Technical Barriers and Promote Interoperability for Greater Patient Information Sharing
WAYNE, Penn. - February 26, 2007 - Believing that an open technology platform is vital for enabling health information exchange and the potential it holds for improving healthcare, MEDecision, Inc. (NASDAQ: MEDE) has formed the Interoperability Competency Center, a new group that will work to establish the technical requirements and interoperability standards necessary for the open exchange of patient health information among the healthcare industry's key stakeholders.
MEDecision, a provider of software, services and clinical content to healthcare payers, has charged the Interoperability Competency Center with expanding patient health information sources and eliminating the technical barriers associated with supplying actionable clinical data at the point of care. The group's ultimate goal is to establish and advance an open and clear-cut path for information exchange between patients, payers and providers.
MEDecision will be exhibiting in booth # 2731 at HIMSS07 (Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society) Annual Conference and Exhibition, running February 25 - March 1, 2007 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
"An open technology platform is crucial to the advancement of health information exchange and the benefits it will bring to the healthcare system," said MEDecision President and Chief Operating Officer John H. Capobianco. "The Interoperability Competency Center will promote the openness and interoperability necessary to ensure that clinical data sharing and deployment is as dynamic and effective as it can be to the benefit of as many people as possible."
Capobianco said the Interoperability Competency Center will pursue its objectives through three main strategies:
1) Promoting interoperability standards in health information exchange that support the bi-directional flow of information between patients, payers and providers
2) Defining the technical frameworks to facilitate the exchange of information between disparate software systems and applications
3) Forging new CollaboraCare Consortium partnerships with companies committed to interoperability
The Interoperability Competency Center's primary responsibilities will be to work extensively with standards developing organizations and other national groups to advocate adherence to established health information interoperability standards, and to drive the creation of new standards where none exist.
Additionally, the Interoperability Competency Center will pursue several measures aimed at making MEDecision a national leader in industry-wide data exchange capabilities. First, the group will seek and develop new relationships with other related technology interests. It will also enhance and expand the partnerships MEDecision has established through the CollaboraCare Consortium - a 14-member group of software, services and data suppliers the company formed in 2005 to expedite the exchange and deployment of electronic health information. The Interoperability Competency Center hopes to leverage these associations to produce new and innovative technologies that will bring forth the next generation of health information exchange.
So far, the Interoperability Competency Center's efforts have resulted in a number of important collaborations. MEDecision recently announced a joint effort with Medem, Inc., a leading provider of online physician-patient communications services, in which MEDecision will deliver its Patient Clinical Summary, a payer-based, clinically validated electronic health record, to patients and their providers through iHealth, Medem's secure, interactive and fully transportable online personal health record. Additionally, MEDecision has completed a number of interoperability projects with its customer Health Care Service Corporation, a mutual insurance company that operates the Blue Cross and Blue Shield plans in Illinois, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.
MEDecision has named Gary M. Austin vice president of the Interoperability Competency Center. He brings to the role extensive experience as MEDecision's vice president for national health information infrastructure (NHII), through which he became a nationally recognized NHII evangelist and expert on regional health information organizations. Austin has been extensively involved in leveraging MEDecision's knowledge of payer data and data management tools to provide speed-to-value in launching health information exchange initiatives.
MEDecision created the Interoperability Competency Center as part of a larger overall initiative it has launched to drive greater adoption of health information exchange between patients, payers and providers. MEDecision has also formed a second group - the Center for Collaborative Health - to address workflow process requirements to ensure patient information is fully utilized by providers at the point of care. Collectively, the two centers will facilitate MEDecision's efforts to deliver more complete patient clinical information at the point of care for faster and more informed decisions that can ultimately improve medical outcomes and lower healthcare costs.
Impetus for MEDecision's new strategic initiative came from the results of an economic benefit study commissioned by MEDecision and conducted by HealthCore, Inc., an outcomes research firm, that analyzed the financial implications of providing MEDecision's Patient Clinical Summary to emergency department physicians at Christiana Care Health System's Level-1 Trauma Center in Wilmington, Delaware. The report concluded that each transmitted Patient Clinical Summary generated an average total savings of $545 on emergency department visit costs and first day hospitalization expenses for the subset of patients who were subsequently admitted. In addition, the study found that using the Patient Clinical Summary resulted in significant savings on laboratory testing, cardiac catheterization, and medical and surgical supplies.
For more information on MEDecision, please visit www.MEDecision.com
Resources:
Study: "An Economic Evaluation of Use of a Payer-Based Electronic Health Record within an Emergency Department"
http://event.on24.com/event/35/62/1/rt/1/images/player_docanchr_5/study.pdf
Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC): http://www.hcsc.com/index.htm
Christiana Care Health System: http://www.christianacare.org/
About MEDecision
Founded in 1988, MEDecision provides healthcare payer organizations with software, services and clinical content that allow them to increase administrative efficiency and improve the overall quality and affordability of their members' healthcare. A provider of Collaborative Care Management, MEDecision's technologies analyze data, automate payer workflow processes and electronically connect patients, providers and payers to give each a common view of the patient's medical history, helping to foster better clinical decision making. MEDecision believes that, in the aggregate, its customers insure or manage care for approximately one in every six people in the U.S. with health insurance. For more information, please visit www.MEDecision.com
CONTACTS:
Tracey Kohler Costello,
MEDecision,
(610) 540-0202,
Tracey.Costello@MEDecision.com
Laura Paden,
TECHMarket Communications,
(818) 597-0480,
Laura@TECHMarket.com
