Industry Insight

Seven Health Systems Form Interstate Alliance

Seven health systems have announced the formation of AllSpire Health Partners, an interstate consortium that will address quality, population health management, best practices, and medical research in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The seven participating systems are Atlantic Health System (Morristown, New Jersey), Hackensack University Health Network (Hackensack, New Jersey), Lancaster General Health (Lancaster, Pennsylvania), Lehigh Valley Health Network (Allentown, Pennsylvania), Meridian Health (Neptune, New Jersey), Reading Health System (Reading, Pennsylvania), and WellSpan Health (York, Pennsylvania). Together, the alliance contains 25 hospitals, has a service area of more than 6 million people, and has a combined revenue of more than $10 billion, making it the largest health care consortium in the country.

AllSpire Health Partners was created to implement the Triple Aim, which consists of improving the patient experience, improving population health, and creating more affordable health care.

The new consortium will carry out joint activities in traditional areas of patient care services, research, and education to enhance the value of health care that communities receive. In addition, it will address economies of scale, shared best practices to improve health outcomes, and identify opportunities in the new era of health care delivery. The alliance will develop and participate in shared services to reduce costs.

— Source: AllSpire Health Partners

 

Electronic Tool Helps Reduce Deaths From Pneumonia in EDs

A study has found that an electronic decision-support tool helped to reduce deaths from pneumonia in four hospital emergency departments (EDs). The findings could lead to improvements in pneumonia care and patient outcomes.

Although guidelines for treating pneumonia exist, it is often difficult for them to be fully implemented in an emergency setting. The researchers therefore developed an electronic tool linked to a patient's medical record. Unlike a paper guideline, the tool automatically extracts data that predict the severity of pneumonia and then provides recommendations regarding where the patient should be admitted, which diagnostic tests are best to use, and which antibiotics are most appropriate.

Researchers from Intermountain Healthcare and the University of Utah tested the effectiveness of the tool on pneumonia patients in seven EDs. The first group of 2,308 patients was analyzed before the electronic tool was used. A later group of 2,450 patients was assessed when four of the seven EDs used the electronic tool. In both groups, the researchers looked at hospital admission rates, length of hospital stay, deaths, secondary hospitalization rates, and adherence to guidelines.

The results showed a significant reduction in death rates in the EDs where the tool was used. Crude inpatient mortality rate fell from 5.3% to 3.5% and, after adjusting for severity, the relative risk of death was reduced by 25%.

— Source: European Lung Foundation

 

Mobile EHR Apps in Demand

Black Book Rankings recently surveyed physicians on mobile device EHR application demand. Desire for mobile apps and their actual use remain two separate matters as more programs are introduced, according to Black Book. Although 89% of primary care and internal medicine physicians surveyed use smartphones primarily to communicate with staff, and 51% use tablets to perform independent medical reference and Internet research, less than 1% estimate they are maximizing their mobile clinical and business applications use.

Currently, 8% of the office-based physicians surveyed use a mobile device for ePrescribing, accessing records, ordering tests, or viewing results. However, 83% indicated they would immediately utilize mobile EHR functionalities to update patient charts, check labs, and order medications if available to them via their current EHR.

In a separate Black Book poll of hospital chief information officers with network physician practices, mobile applications ranked above cloud computing, clinical analytics, and business intelligence in upcoming technology urgencies. “The business priorities of operational results and reducing costs combined with the digital management requirements for records, access, identity, and risk have health care information executives seeking broader EHR solutions with useful mobile applications,” explains Doug Brown, managing partner of Black Book Research.

Although authorities debate the advantages of virtualized vs. native iPad implementations, current users of both mobile EHR application types note past flaws that require the most technological attention. Of the mobile app issues most criticized, 95% of physicians indicated the small screen size as their biggest problem; 88% indicated difficulties in the ease of movement within the chart; 83% do not want an EHR system replicated on their mobile device, preferring simplified versions; and 71% do not appreciate nonoptimized touch screens.

Ultimately, practice leaders and clinicians seek to enhance health care delivery and reduce medical liability through documentation of out-of-office practices, including lost reimbursement. The highest ranked EHR mobile applications determined from client experience polling had 10 common characteristics: the ability to remotely review charts, update charts, assign tasks, view schedules and appointments, send messages to practice staff, order labs and review results, permit ePrescribing, document patient encounters, input vital signs, and access EHR data after office hours.

— Source: Black Book Rankings