In The Know - MEDSEEK News and Expert Opinion on the eHealth Industry

A new virtual door opens

We live in an internet world where we visit Web sites that range from painful to look at and navigate – to easy to use and beautiful to see. In the September issue of eHealthcare Strategy & Trends, Mark Goldberg reviewed a new site, www.devoschildrens.org.

He provides the following comments on the Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital site:

“A pleasure to view”
“Navigational links … greatly aids navigation”
“Nothing childish about the site”
Very well designed for their target audience”

MEDSEEK was pleased to be part of the development process with our client and their agency to launch this site. To read the full article, click here. And be sure to check out the site for yourself. I recommend visiting the Should I call the doctor? section and the Fact Sheet.

Digital health: Struggle or a pipedream?

In their series of special reports entitled “Fixing Health Care,” CNNMoney.com asks the question: With the target date for the stimulus plan's electronic health record program just 5 years off, is digital health possible? In the interview, three health care providers' stories reveal that hospitals may have a difficult road ahead.

David Goodman conducted interviews with key contacts at three hospitals that have undergone enormous efforts to make digital health a reality and he finds out what advice they can offer to others working on their HIE initiatives. In the article Gary Bowers describes the Western North Carolina Network (WNC) where MEDSEEK connected 16 hospitals across the region. Gary explains what he believes is in store for other states as they begin to take on the project.

To read the article on CNNMoney follow this link.

To find out more about the WNC project and to learn how 16 independent hospitals jointly save $1.4 million annually, read the case study or watch the video.

And to learn what you can do to get started on your health information exchange in order to meet the government’s new “meaningful use” standards and HITECH initiatives, visit www.medseek.com/hie.

Spectrum Health is creating multiple doors to their hospital

Spectrum Health is working toward “Destination Health,” its goal of becoming America’s highest quality and most successful healthcare enterprise by 2010. They not only are opening new doors to facilities but are opening electronic doors to improve the experience for the healthcare community. To read where they are doing this follow the link and see Spectrum listed under the “more virtual hospital tours” section.

http://www.healthcare-informatics.com

Congratulations to Poudre Valley Medical System for winning the Baldrige National Quality Award

All of us at MEDSEEK want to recognize and extend our congratulations to our client, Poudre Valley Medical System, for winning the prestigious Baldrige National Quality Award.  This award is given by the National Institute of Standards and Technology to recognize manufacturing, small business, service, education and healthcare organizations that demonstrate sustainable performance excellence. Clearly this demands commitment to a journey from the entire organization to meet the high standards to achieve this award. Even more impressive is that PVHS is one of only three organizations across the country to receive this award and is the only healthcare organization!

MEDSEEK whole-heartedly believes that Poudre Valley Health System exemplifies the qualities the Baldrige Award recognizes: innovation, excellence and world-class performance.  To read what is required and the press release please click here.

MEDSEEK Leads in KLAS® for Clinical Portal Software Solution - MEDSEEK Leads KLAS ® Portals Segment as of August 22, 2008

MEDSEEK recently received the news... we are leading in KLAS® rankings for our Clinical Portal software solution.

Texas Health Resources Launches MEDSEEK Consumer Portal

Consumers benefit from convenient online registration, bill pay and health library

MEDSEEK Unveils New Educational Webinar Series: reThinking eHealth

Birmingham, Ala.– July 15, 2008 –MEDSEEK, the leading provider of enterprise portal connectivity solutions, announced today that it will present a monthly webinar series focused on the unique challenges facing the healthcare industry in the “Age of Consumerism.”

MEDSEEK signs 59 new software agreements and consulting projects during 2007

Today we announced the results from 2007, and it was another great year of revenue growth. During the year we welcomed 19 new health system customers (representing over 40 hospitals) and signed 59 software agreements and professional services engagements. While we finished our seventh consecutive year of revenue growth, we tackled some challenges and continue to work hard to serve our customers as we grow. We are very excited about 2008, as it will be a year of continued growth and new product innovation.

“Over the past 12 months, MEDSEEK has made a significant investment towards the development of a state of the art technology platform that will be the foundation for the delivery of MEDSEEK solutions to the market over the next 5 – 7 years”, said Peter Kuhn, president of MEDSEEK. “We are proud of the work we started to enhance our enterprise portal offering and continue to work hard to deliver these enhancements in 2008”.

For the complete press release visit our news channel.

Hospitals from around the nation converge on Omaha to share cost and quality transparency best practices

Last week Alegent Health and MEDSEEK hosted the inaugural "Power to the Patient"forum in Omaha, Neb. The purpose of the hands-on, practical workshop was to share Alegent's experiences in deploying MyCost [cost transparency web-based application] with health systems around the nation. With more than 45 attendees from over 10 organizations from diverse markets converging to learn how to enhance the experience their patients and community has with their organizations, we can say the event was a huge success.

MyCost was born out of Alegent's decision to offer a consumer-driven health plan (CDHP) option for its 8,500 employees, and the need for transparency in enabling consumers [their employees] to make informed decisions based on quality and cost of service.

As a result of strong leadership, and the desire to do the right thing for it's employees and community, MyCost and Quality Reports were published via Alegent's web site in early 2007 and late 2006, respectively.

The service, despite early trepidation, has been widely adopted by the community and the forum was conceived by Alegent and MEDSEEK to share their successes and lessons learned with other organizations.

To learn more about Alegent Health's experience read their case study.

 

One million health consumers and counting

Not all RHIOs are fading.  Just look north for clinical connectivity and interoperability success.  William Osler Health Centre, with partners AGFA Healthcare and MEDSEEK, is delivering real clinical value to their physicians and community.

Here's a quote from Judy Middleton, CIO at William Osler, published in a recent article in The Brampton Guardian regarding Osler's successful adoption of MEDSEEK's Clinical Portal and it's expansion to the entire LHIN.   

clipped from www.northpeel.com "This makes us trailblazers," said Judy Middleton, Chief Information Officer for WOHC. "If a physician has a patient at Osler, and the patient says 'I've been at Oakville or I've been at Credit Valley', then all the information from their visits will be accessible by the physician. So in terms of expediting treatment and care, you have much more information (at your disposal)."