HIMSS Honors Two With Davies EHR Award
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
Awards granted for excellence in use of HIT and EHRs
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics and Lakeland HealthCare in St. Joseph, MI are among the 2014 Enterprise Davies Award winners for excellence in the use of health care information technology (HIT), particularly the use of EHRs, according to the HIMSS website.
As the site explains, “Since 1994, the HIMSS Nicholas E. Davies Award of Excellence has recognized outstanding achievement of organizations who have utilized health information technology to substantially improve patient outcomes while achieving return on investment. The Davies Awards program promotes EHR-enabled improvement in patient outcomes through sharing case studies and lessons learned on implementation strategies, workflow design, best practice adherence, and patient engagement.”
Davies Enterprise Award winners are Stage 7 and 6 hospitals or healthcare delivery organizations, as identified by the Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model (EMRAM) developed in 2005 by HIMSS. The EMRAM is an eight-step methodology to evaluate the progress and effect of EHRs for hospitals. Stage 7 is the final state, and represents an advanced patient record environment.
“University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics have done a tremendous job of leveraging information technology to integrate efforts to improve quality and the financial bottom line at the same time,” Jonathan French, HIMSS director of quality and patient safety told HIT Consultant. “UIHC’s use of information technology to improve care delivery and documentation has resulted in significantly improved clinical outcomes leading to cost avoidance, efficiencies, reduction in claims rejections, and increased revenue.
“Thus, UIHC has achieved a positive return on investment without even factoring in meaningful use dollars. The Davies Committee and HIMSS congratulate the University of Iowa Hospital and Clinics staff for its focus on improving the health outcomes of their patient population through the effective use of health IT.”
Meanwhile, Lakeland Healthcare, which runs three hospitals, became fully operational on an Epic EHR by early 2012. The healthcare system generated a return on investment of nearly $22 million over the next two years according to a case study submitted to HIMSS. The HIMSS report notes they “completed a big bang implementation across their acute and ambulatory care settings in 2012 using a ‘speed to value approach.’”
Among their quality of care improvements were a reduction of transcription-related adverse drug events from 30 prior to the EHR to 0 in 2013; raising immunization tracking rates from 25 percent in October 2011 to 39 percent two years later; decreasing sepsis mortality by seven percent three months after implementation; improving radiation safety with software that prompted 26 imaging cancellations or changes in about a year; identifying patients due for a prostate specific antigen (PSA) test; and decreasing the fall rate by nearly 12 percent and falls with injury by 24 percent in 2012, according to the case study.