Genesis Health System Repeats As One Of Nation’s 100 Most Wired

Davenport, IA – The investment of Genesis Health System in technology has also been an investment in quality and safety of patient care.

The correlation between new technology and quality patient care has earned Genesis recognition as one of the nation’s 100 Most Wired hospitals and health systems for the second consecutive year.

The 100 Most Wired were selected by Hospitals & Health Networks magazine  based on their use of information technology to accomplish key goals, including safety and quality objectives. A total of 502 surveys were submitted, representing 1,255 hospitals.

“This recognition confirms for us that we are going in the right direction in leveraging information technology as a means for providing safe, quality care for our patients,’’ said Rob Frieden, Vice President of Information Services, Genesis Health System. “This award also identifies Genesis as one of the leaders in the country in moving toward electronic medical record keeping.

“Genesis is one of the hospitals at the forefront of where the President wants to go in implementing a national electronic network for medical records.’’

The Bush administration set a goal last year that every American will have an electronic medical record (EMR) within 10 years.

Genesis Health System already is providing a service that allows patients a secure portal for maintaining their personal health information.  My e-health, a free feature of the Genesis Health System Web site --- allows registered members and families to create accounts where they can maintain records of their medications and take self-evaluations called Health Risk Assessments.

Genesis also uses PACS, or Picture Archiving and Communication System, to electronically store radiology images, which can then be viewed by clinicians at multiple PC-based viewing stations throughout the Genesis hospitals.

In selecting the 100 Most Wired hospitals and health systems, Hospitals & Health Networks magazine noted that while the new survey does not establish “cause and effect’’ between information technology use and improved patient outcomes, it demonstrates that technology can play an important role in quality.

“There are three key differences in how hospitals apply and use information technology to improve care,’’ said Alden Solovy, Executive Editor of Hospitals & Health Networks, the journal of the American Hospital Association. “The Most Wired use a wider array of IT tools to address quality and safety, they have a significantly larger percentage of physicians who enter orders themselves and they conduct a larger percentage of clinical activities via information technology.’’

According to the outcomes analysis conducted for the magazine by Solucient, the 100 Most Wired hospitals have, on average, risk-adjusted mortality rates that are 7.2 percent lower than other hospitals, even after controlling for the size of the hospital and teaching status.

“This is the first analysis showing that the nation’s top tech hospitals also have better outcomes,’’ Solovy said. “The analysis compared mortality results for the 2005 list of Most Wired and the rest of the nation.’’

The Most Wired Survey and Benchmarking Study measures the nation’s hospitals on their use of information technologies for quality, customer service, public health and safety, building processes and workforce issues.

Frieden cited several technology innovations Genesis has initiated since being recognized as a Most Wired hospital last year. They are:

LifeBook – Nurses and doctors can carry tablet PCs between rooms for point of care documentation. LifeBook provides electronic record keeping that can be retrieved by doctors on a network. Physicians in the Emergency Department can document patient care at the bedside and provide electronic documentation to the patient’s primary care physician.

Vocera Communications System – Hands-free communications system allows caregivers to be contacted by name within the organization instantly without any dialing. Nurses at bedsides can contact doctors in the hospital and converse while keeping their hands free for patient care. Vocera “badges’’ allow for text messaging and alerts.

Central monitoring – Patient vital signs can be monitored from a centralized location. The centralized monitoring does not replace on-site monitoring, but is available 24 hours a day.

Electronic medication administration – An application that allows nurses to document medication, including IVs, that they have delivered to patients. This can be done at the point of care using the LifeBook tablet PC.

“There are always new innovations. We want to be at the forefront whenever we can improve patient care and the safety of our patients,’’ Frieden added.  “Technology is a critical component of our health care system, allowing us to have a seamless flow of information that connects us both internally and externally.’’

Genesis Medical Center, Davenport is one of 89 health care organizations on the list of 100 that have made the list more than once.