Clara Maass health information exchange; live in less than two months

Donald Lutz, CIO

“Axolotl’s technology was easily and quickly implemented – exceeding our goals. It was clear they were interface experts”
-Donald Lutz, CIO, Clara Maass Medical Center

Overview

Founded in 1868 as the Newark German Hospital, Clara Maass Medical Center, an affiliate of the Saint Barnabas Health Care System, provides a comprehensive continuum of care to the residents of northern New Jersey. As New Jersey's largest integrated health care delivery system, Clara Maass is a 465-bed facility staffed by more than 700 physicians and 2,000 employees, delivering care to more than 19,000 residents each year.

The Challenges

Like many hospitals, Clara Maass wanted to enable its physicians and staff to electronically receive and send patient information to improve patient safety and clinical outcomes. However, with patient data residing in many different departments, getting a complete view of the patient proved to be challenging.

Interoperability between disparate systems, to ensure that clinical information was available when and where it is needed, became the driving technology strategy. In order to deliver on its mission of providing high-quality patient care services, Clara Maass needed to replace its existing portal approach with an interoperable solution that would enable all of their ambulatory physicians to achieve 'meaningful use' as well as to have secure access to a complete and comprehensive view of the patient.

In late 2008, Donald Lutz, Chief Information Officer of Clara Maass Medical Center was tasked to seek a solution that would solve these challenges and provide an affordable EMR for ambulatory physicians that were not already electronic.

The Solution

Clara Maass went through a very extensive vendor review and teamed up with Axolotl Corp. to develop a health information exchange (HIE) for its physicians. Axolotl's experience and proven success in deploying other advanced HIEs across the country, as well as their easy to deploy and maintain SaaS (sofware as a service) model, Clara Maass Medical Center teamed with Axolotl to meet their aggressive implementation goals. Within 60 days, Clara Maass Medical Center was "live" with Axolotl's Elysium Exchange - delivering lab, radiology, transcription, admissions and discharge summaries to Clara Maass physicians and staff.

"Physicians don't have time to go looking for data on their patients. They want to be notified when new information is available, and receive relevant clinical data automatically in a format that is useful and manageable. Axolotl's technology solves this challenge while also providing an affordable well rounded EMR Lite product for our ambulatory physicians," shared Donald Lutz, Chief Information Officer, Clara Maass Medical Center.

Today, Clara Maass Medical Center HIE provides physicians clinical information directly into their tool of choice - their existing EMR or Elysium, Axolotl's Web-based, CCHIT certified  EMR; provided by Clara Maass to any affiliated practice.

With Elysium EMR, physicians are accomplishing 'meaningful use' and simplifying communications. They electronically receive and manage their patients' incoming clinical information, write and fill prescriptions, and will soon be ordering lab and radiology tests from a single, Web-based application. Physicians are able to communicate across disparate EMRs, sharing referrals and other patient data instantly - speeding the process of care for the patient.

Using the Elysium Virtual Health Record (VHR), authorized physicians can access a comprehensive view of the patient. Using a hybrid federated model, data is collected and displayed from multiple HIS and EMR systems, located across the community. Lab reports, medication history, allergies, problem lists, etc., are displayed in a tabular format, and unlike a portal, allow the physician to forward relevant information directly to their own EMR.

"With a patient's approval, the Elysium VHR allows authorized clinicians to retrieve relevant information instantly. This comprehensive view of the patient drastically reduces drug interactions, unnecessary tests and treatments and enables the doctor to quickly and efficiently administer care," said Thomas A. Biga, Executive Director, Clara Maass Medical Center.

Since deploying Elysium Exchange, Clara Maass Medical Center has quickly connected ambulatory physicians that did not have an EMR, with Axolotls' CCHIT certified Elysium EMR and improved care with the community-wide Elysium VHR. Physicians benefit from significant time savings of having all the patient data available, enabling them to spend more time with patients and focus on delivering the highest quality of care.

Summary of Results

• Implemented Axolotl's Elysium Exchange in a record setting timeframe and connected all of their physicians while conserving current IT infrastructure
• Complete interoperability and full collaboration on patient care
• Web-based CCHIT certified solution that immediately connects physicians not already electronic and provides secure exchange and EMR capabilities - all for less than $100 a month
• Share patient data information electronically, instantly and securely with other practices within the Clara Maass Medical Center HIE
• Ability to order services, such as laboratory tests, view results and update patient medical health records 24/7 from a single interface; providing the entire community HIE with a current, complete picture of health for the patient
• Physicians can immediately review preventative and chronic disease care history, make referrals, fill prescriptions and review lab data
• Significant time savings for physicians as a result of having access to patient data at the time of care