When EMR Is Not Enough

By Vicki Amendola, Editor, Health IT Outcomes

Integrated document management enables Princeton Community Hospital to condense document deficiency corrections from weeks to days.

Using the title of Princeton in connection with a hospital facility likely conjures an image in your mind of a large university medical center. Such is not the case when the facility in question is Princeton Community Hospital located in Princeton, West Virginia. Opened in December 1970 as a 156-bed acute care general hospital, the facility has expanded over the years but has maintained its roots as a community-based private hospital with just over 250 beds. Since its inception, the hospital staff has grown from 13 physicians and 125 employees to more than 150 doctors and 1,000 employees. One of Princeton's technology milestones included the 1998 installation of a complete MEDITECH CS EMR, well in advance of today's healthcare IT incentives. However, even with the adoption of EMR, Princeton still found itself facing challenges with medical record-keeping a decade later.