Ashe Memorial Hospital, a critical access hospital in rural Jefferson, N.C., is aiming to achieve ARRA-HITECH “Meaningful Use” standards in 2011 and the hospital selected PatientKeeper CPOE for this purpose. This solution will be the centerpiece of a physician automation initiative at Ashe Memorial Hospital.
CPOE is a fundamental requirement of the HITECH Act. Without it, hospitals will not qualify for HITECH Stimulus Incentives.
The products purchased by Ashe Memorial include PatientKeeper Mobile Clinical Results, which lets doctors access patient clinical data anywhere from smartphones and other handheld devices; PatientKeeper Physician Portal, which provides a comprehensive view of clinical data from any web browser; and PatientKeeper NoteWriter, which reduces the time it takes for physicians to write clinical notes.
“Our relationship with Ashe Memorial is based on PatientKeeper’s ability to support the unique needs of Critical Access Hospitals,” said Paul Brient, president and CEO of PatientKeeper, in a press release. “Hospitals serving small rural communities are under pressure to implement technology specified by federal HITECH legislation, but have more limited financial resources than academic medical centers. The fact that our solutions work with their existing back-end systems makes adding new functionality for physicians a viable option.”
With the help of PatientKeeper CPOE, physicians can easily adopt CPOE and save time. The solution is designed to support the way physicians already practice. As a result of better communication and information exchange among the hospital’s medical staff and support areas, the patients are expected to receive better care. As this new the software integrates with Ashe Memorial’s current MEDITECH system, implementing PatientKeeper will be cost-effective for the hospital.
Recently, the company received the award for “Best Innovation in Mobile Health Technology for Patient Safety” at the Mobile Health Expo 2010 awards ceremony in Las Vegas. Mobile Health Expo focuses on the convergence of mobile technology and healthcare across the entire mobile health ecosystem, including mHealth, telemedicine, wireless and connected health, and e-patient. The company was honored for the PatientKeeper Mobile CPOE product.
Raju Shanbhag is a contributing editor for HealthTechZone. To read more of Raju’s articles, please visit his columnist page.Edited by
Jaclyn Allard
