Kansas Health Information Network (KHIN) and eHealthAlign Merge Technology Contracts To Leverage the Full Force of ICA’s C

KHIN to Manage Health Information Exchange Contract To Ensure that Initial Goals of Efficiencies and Scale are Met

TOPEKA, Kan. & NASHVILLE, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- ICA (www.icainformatics.com) announced today that Kansas Health Information Network (KHIN) (www.khinonline.org) and eHealthAlign (www.ehealthalign.org) have been working together for the last six months to bring their two ICA Health Information Exchange (HIE) technology contracts together.

KHIN will manage the contract and work directly with ICA. The merger will allow one standardized approach across Kansas and western Missouri for management of the health information exchange technology infrastructure. The merging of the two contracts will ensure that all efficiencies of scale related to the help desk, project management, training team, education and outreach, analytics and interface costs to state level services are not duplicated. This arrangement will result in significant cost savings for providers. The KHIN HIE Collaborative includes Kansas Medical Society, Kansas Hospital Association, eHealthAlign and the Wichita Health Information Exchange. The Collaborative will draw upon CareAlign’s powerful clinical informatics engine to improve patient care coordination and quality while ensuring patient privacy.

Laura McCrary Ed.D, Executive Director of KHIN, said, “The Kansas Health Information Network is focused upon five projects that span the entire state of Kansas and western Missouri. The five projects include the development of exchange capability in Wichita, Kansas City and the rural portions of Kansas (RHIN), the implementation of secure clinical messaging for eligible providers and the development of an interface to the Kansas Immunization Registry, or KSWebIZ.” KSWebIZ is a web-based centralized birth to death database that maintains complete, accurate and secure immunization records for all Kansas residents.

Dr. McCrary continued, “Full exchange functionality is in process for Wichita, Kansas City and the RHIN. In Wichita the Virtual Private Network (VPN) has been built for the testing of data with Via Christi, the largest hospital in the state. In Kansas City, work has begun with The University of Kansas and their EHR vendor, Epic, to build the VPN and test the data. In the rural portions of the state, eleven hospitals have signed participation agreements and business associate agreements with KHIN. VPNs are currently being built for Hays Medical Center and Pratt Regional Medical Center. Additional RHIN participants include Hutchinson Clinic and the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas. Both of these practices have multiple locations throughout the state. Technical discovery has started with the Great Plains Health Alliance and their 29 hospitals and associated clinics.”

Gary Zegiestowsky, Chief Executive Officer at ICA, noted, “The merger of KHIN and eHealthAlign is a practical, cost-saving move that will further the HIE goals of this broad region covering both densely populated and rural areas in eastern Kansas and western Missouri. The CareAlign platform will serve all of Kansas including the Kansas City region which has over 36 hospitals, 3,000 primary care physicians, in 13 counties in Kansas and 12 counties in Missouri. CareAlign’s robust, multi-featured HIE includes EHR-Lite capabilities to meet the needs of physician practices currently without EMRs, an intuitive clinical and patient portal functionality, as well as secure clinical communications all to promote adoption of information sharing among clinical personnel and the patients they serve.”

Secure Clinical Messaging

A group of 34 physicians and other eligible providers worked with the KHIN and ICA project management teams to pilot the secure clinical messaging process that allows eligible providers to exchange clinical information with other health care providers. Inception to rollout took only six weeks of deployment time enabling physicians to meet the Meaningful Use core measure of exchanging healthcare data with an unaffiliated provider. The group attended online training and gained access to the KHIN secure clinical messaging site to create a message. All participants in the pilot group will utilize their EHR to create a Continuity of Care Document (CCD) and then attach it to a KHIN secure message. The physician is then able to send the message with patient health information securely to another provider.

The pilot group will provide feedback to KHIN and ICA project management teams. In September through December 2011 all other providers will receive instructions and the necessary protocols to securely message another provider and qualify for incentive payments. To date, approximately 400 Kansas physicians and eligible providers are expected to securely exchange information in 2011 using the KHIN platform.

For more information on the merger between KHIN and eHealthAlign, click on this link which will connect you to the July-August 2011 KHIN Newsletter. http://khinonline.org/news/july-august-2011.

About The Kansas Health Information Network (KHIN)

KHIN’s mission is to operate and maintain a health information exchange technology services organization. It draws users from a broad geographical area that encompasses a multi-state region and aligns with state designated health information exchanges to support cost effective delivery of services. It supports and integrates with community health information exchanges to drive care coordination and workflow changes creating a climate to encourage innovation. Its goals are to ensure providers, patients and communities have long-term access to cost effective, sustainable health information exchange aligned with costs distributed across a broad user base. It also encourages and removes barriers so community exchanges can focus on innovation and entrepreneurial strategies that effect local health outcomes.

About Informatics Corporation of America (ICA)

Informatics Corporation of America (ICA) was established to take innovative technology developed by Vanderbilt Medical Center to the broader healthcare market, and now delivers a comprehensive HIE solution to hospitals, IDNs, communities and states. Unmatched in its ability to yield cost efficiency, improved patient care, and better outcomes, ICA’s CareAlign solution captures complete data to enhance the decision-making process. The CareAlign clinical intelligence engine empowers HIEs to leverage existing core systems and construct a longitudinal patient record. CareAlign also features provider/patient portals, secure clinical communication, NHIN compliant interoperability, EHR-lite and population management tools. Visit www.icainformatics.com; follow us on Twitter: www.Twitter.com/ icainformatics; and Facebook: www.facebook.com



CONTACT:

For ICA
Dodge Communications
Elisabeth Deckon; 770-576-2550
[email protected]

KEYWORDS:   United States  North America  Kansas  Tennessee

INDUSTRY KEYWORDS:   Technology  Data Management  Software  Practice Management  Health  Hospitals

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