Virginia Commonwealth University Health System Selects 4medica's Web-Based Integrated Health Record

RICHMOND, Va., Nov. 10, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- Virginia Commonwealth University Health System's Department of Pathology Laboratories (VCU), a clinical, research, and teaching department of the School of Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center, today announced that it has selected 4medica's Integrated Health Record (IHR) solutions, Lab4IHR and Path4IHR, to provide web-based access to clinical and anatomic pathology lab orders/results to-and-from fifteen different locations that produce 2.9 million billable tests per year.

4medica's IHR platform offers intuitive, easy-to-deploy and easy-to-use solutions in a software-as-a-service (SaaS) distribution model. This makes it possible for VCU's more than 800 community referring physicians that practice in more than 225 locations in Central Virginia – with or without an electronic medical record (EMR) –  to electronically exchange and gain immediate access to patient-centric, real-time, actionable lab data for more-informed clinical decisions at the point of care.

"Our goal was to implement lab outreach technology that enhances provider satisfaction, as well as patient safety and care quality. To do this, we needed a round-the-clock system that allows lab tests to be placed and results to be available via any computer with an internet connection," said David Wilkinson, M.D., Ph.D., Chairman of the Department of Pathology at VCU. "4medica's Integrated Health Record was able to fulfill this tall order by giving us a robust, user-friendly, web-based solution that provides the integration we need that enables the online registration, placement and retrieval of test orders in real time, while allowing the reliable and secure exchange of patient demographic and insurance information."

Wilkinson continued, "To help encourage collaborative care within our health system, clinical integration and interoperability were also a key factor in the system selection process. With 4medica, a high level of connectivity is not only available with our referring providers' various EMR and practice management technology, but also with our internal lab information system and registration and billing platforms. Needless to say, implementing the IHR presented an ideal opportunity to deliver a cost-effective, accurate and efficient order entry system to our clients, giving us a definite strategic advantage to increase our footprint in the Richmond area."

VCU will be implementing the cloud-driven IHR modules in a two-phased approach, focusing on providing electronic lab results first and then moving to allow the placement of electronic orders. It plans to be fully connected via this clinical integration system by 2011.

"The practice of healthcare today is increasingly dependent on health IT to improve health outcomes. Laboratory results represent the most prevalent clinical data, contributing to more than 70% of the clinical decisions. It is very important for an organization like VCU – that provides leading critical care services and research – to provide easy exchange of electronic clinical data internally and with their referring providers," said Ravi Sharma, CEO of 4medica. "As a progressive organization, VCU understands the importance of this level of connectivity and we are honored that its Department of Pathology Laboratories has selected the IHR to ensure data sharing across disparate information systems and care settings."

About Virginia Commonwealth University Health System's Department of Pathology Laboratories

The Department of Pathology is a diverse clinical, research, and teaching department of the School of Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center, located in Richmond, Virginia. It offer a full range of pathology services to physicians, researchers, and patients at the Medical College of Virginia Hospitals, a 780-bed tertiary-care urban teaching hospital dedicated to serving the patients and physicians of central Virginia. Within the department, there are 15 clinical laboratories and its clinical laboratories are staffed by 266 full-time equivalent hospital employees. Its labs will perform more than two million billable tests this year. It is certified by the Federal Government under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments of 1988 (CLIA), and are fully accredited by the College of American Pathologists and the American Association of Blood Banks.

About 4medica

4medica is the nation's leading provider of web-based applications designed to create easy access to patient-centric, real-time, actionable data by integrating information from legacy systems at multiple inpatient and outpatient locations. Starting out as a lab outreach connectivity company, 4medica has expanded its offerings into an Integrated Health Record (IHR) that helps hospitals and physician practices leverage existing technology systems while improving the access and functionality they lack. Its IHR application suite, which was developed in collaboration with physicians, has already received unrivalled acceptance and adoption because of its powerful, yet intuitive functionality, coupled with its demonstrated ability to help reduce costs, improve quality of care and favorably impact clinical outcomes. 4medica continues to build on its success in connecting over 100 institutional customers with over 22,000 physicians. For more information, visit http://www.4medica.com.

SOURCE 4medica