e-Zassi.com has expanded its online product application so members can extract critical technical and business-related traits and attributes from new medical device technologies to facilitate the ability of innovators and others involved in medical device invention to deeply analyze and forecast the opportunities and the challenges from time of invention throughout all development and commercialization phases.

The new easy-to-use software has been created to deliver powerful development and commercially related outputs that are critical to such activities as:

  • technology transfer;
  • business development;
  • market and commercial analysis;
  • due diligence & portfolio management;
  • intellectual property and patent development;
  • product development and financial planning; and
  • capital acquisition via venture capital and grants.

According to e-Zassi Chief Executive Officer Peter M. von Dyck: “We recognize the value of being able to gain rapid and deep insights as early as possible into any new medical innovation development and commercialization requirements, which are uniquely calculated by the e-Zassi Innovation Assessment Technology.”   He adds that: “Not knowing critical details can dramatically hinder a technology from ever being successfully funded, licensed, developed or commercialized.”  Critical details, says von Dyck, include: a new technology’s probable regulatory classifications; the associated clinical endpoints to support the safety and marketing claims to earn market clearances; early stage clarity on the reimbursement and market landscape; and identification of material manufacturing, distribution and sales burdens.

The e-Zassi platform delivers this decision-support knowledge in minutes rather than months to provide decision-making information to innovators, device manufacturers, service providers, venture capital firms, researchers and healthcare providers as they undergo the processes of due diligence, product and fund development or provide services for bringing to market medical technologies.  It is estimated that the time and costs to provide comparable content and insights to the e-Zassi Assessment platform would take approximately two to three months and cost up to $75,000.

All e-Zassi online elements are uniquely categorized and organized among thousands of Device Network Attributes (DNA) the company identified over several years.  “We now know how this business and technology ‘DNA’ can be leveraged by the members in the e-Zassi Community to rapidly identify synergistic partners and technological opportunities,” says von Dyck.  “Empowering our members to leverage these vital attributes on a private online community materially enhances search/match relevancy on a level not available on any other existing network, which helps lower costs, save time and enhance success rates.”

e-Zassi.com is a subscription based, online community and Software as a Service (SaaS) company that was spun off Zassi Medical Evolutions(r), a privately held company with a 12-year history of innovation and development in medical devices.  Special customized memberships are available now. For more information regarding e-Zassi visit www.e-zassi.com.


Quantum and IBM Align to Drive Medical Home Solution

The Quantum Group, Inc. following the conclusion of the HIMSS09* conference in Chicago, announces its collaboration with IBM to facilitate IBM’s Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) solution – a solution that provides physicians with a 21st Century process for electronic records integration, management, analysis and communication across the healthcare ecosystem. The resulting, EMR-enabled primary care practices will meet President Obama’s vision of an information-based, connected healthcare system.

Despite the national focus on healthcare reform as accelerated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, physicians across the U.S. are asking for practical and affordable ways to integrate digitized healthcare technologies into their practices. PWeR(TM) (Personal Wellness electronic Record(TM)), the Quantum healthcare information technology platform, helps to answer those questions by providing the essential connectivity required to facilitate the IBM Medical Home solution Pc3, Patient Centered Collaborative Care.

Noel J. Guillama, Quantum President & CEO commented, “The Medical Home market is estimated to be a multi-billion dollar opportunity, not including but supported by the $19 billion federal Stimulus Package for healthcare reform. We believe, based on current projections, that we will have our first group of more than 400 physicians on PWeR in the third quarter of this year.”

The PCMH solution is advocated by the Patient-Centered Primary Care Collaborative (PCPCC) (www.pcpcc.net), a coalition of large employers, primary care societies, national health plans, patient groups, and others. Dr. Paul Grundy, Chairman of the PCPCC and IBM Director of Global Healthcare Transformation, commented, “The purpose of PCMH is to provide patients with a primary care team that will provide continuous and coordinated care. By engaging patients with their physicians, they can take real accountability for their health. This will create savvier consumers of care and ultimately better health outcomes. Technology will drive the connectivity required to facilitate this objective and we see PWeR as one of the tangible assets that can be used in these efforts. We believe that the development of PWeR is an ongoing process that will continue to evolve with the active engagement and involvement of primary care physicians.”

“Industry reform will begin from the inside out,” said Dan Pelino, IBM General Manager Global Healthcare Industry. “Change will begin by empowering the physician/patient relationship and it is companies like Quantum, those with business models driven by physician-centric services, that will drive this reform. Quantum’s physician services coupled with the PWeR platform provide a tangible and immediate strategic deployment to market.”

Ronald S. Smith, Quantum Senior Vice President added, “The integration of PWeR into the Pc3 solution will position primary care physicians to engage in the CMS Medical Home program and provide access to added financial revenues not before realized. Doctors can potentially earn from $27 – $100 per eligible member per month based on current estimates, in addition to traditional fee for service fees. We plan to work with the physicians to help navigate the application process. We anticipate that when the final regulations are released that our system will allow the physician to qualify for the Stimulus Package monies as the EMR application of PWeR is 2009 CCHIT certified and meets the current CMS Medical Home requirements.

PWeR is a next generation technology platform that bridges physicians to their patients, hospitals, clinics and related professionals through a Software as a Service (SaaS) and an IBM Hosted Cloud Computing model. Cloud Computing involves the use of scalable resources including virtualized storage and business recovery services that are provided as a service over the Internet. Users do not require knowledge of or expertise in the technology infrastructure “in the cloud” that supports them.

Cloud computing is a natural fit for physician offices as it eliminates the costs associated with in-house, sophisticated server hardware, simplifies records management and facilitates the communications among each patient’s unique care team. This IBM hosted cloud computing approach provides the highest levels of security and privacy to health records.

The PWeR architecture is a seamless approach to facilitating the Medical Home model. PWeR differentiates itself from other traditional electronic medical record (EMR) applications as it embodies a patient-centric, web-based approach that centralizes the multiple sources of patient data in one location. Current applications capture patient data and only retain it in the computer of the recording physician or hospital. PWeR is architected as a system incorporating multiple applications, which include EMR, practice management, billing, e-labs, e-prescriptions, disease management, medical home, messaging, kiosks and many other key functions. EMR is simply one application in this comprehensive system as PWeR follows the entire healthcare delivery process.

PWeR is further supported by IBM products and services including e-Business Hosting provided by Global Technology Services, Call Center, and services including Integration Services, Health Information Exchange (HIE), AMS, Consulting and Development. Quantum will be migrating to the entire Blue Stack, including Websphere, DB2, and Cognos.

Quantum and IBM believe that the PWeR architecture is in line with the national agenda for healthcare reform. As President Obama seeks to infuse efficiencies, reduce costs and improve patient care by leveraging technology, PWeR looks to facilitate these objectives.

Source: The Quantum Group, Inc.


Privacy and Security of Personal Health Information Still Major Concern

As health care providers determine how they will take advantage of the $19 billion allocated in the stimulus package to help jumpstart advances in health information technology (HIT), consumer appetite for electronic health records (EHRs), online tools and services is also growing, according to the results of the 2009 Deloitte Survey of Health Care Consumers (www.deloitte.com/us/2009consumersurvey).

While only 9 percent of consumers surveyed have an electronic personal health record (PHR), 42 percent are interested in establishing PHRs connected online to their physicians. Fifty-five percent want the ability to communicate with their doctor via email to exchange health information and get answers to questions. Fifty-seven percent reported they’d be interested in scheduling appointments, buying prescriptions and completing other transactions online if their information is protected. Technologies that can facilitate consumer transactions with providers and health plans, like integrated billing systems that make bill payment faster and more convenient, are also appealing to nearly half (47 percent) of consumers surveyed.

The survey of more than 4,000 U.S. consumers 18 and over was released today at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Annual Conference held in Chicago. It is the second annual study examining health care consumers’ attitudes, behaviors and unmet needs conducted by the Deloitte Center for Health Solutions offering health care industry leaders and policymakers a timely look at how health care consumerism is evolving.

“Consumers are increasingly embracing innovations that enhance self-care, convenience, personalization and control of personal health information,” said Paul H. Keckley, Ph.D., executive director, Deloitte Center for Health Solutions. “Consumers want a bigger say in their health care decisions. Consumer demand for HIT and its potential impact on reforming the system has never been stronger.”

Despite strong consumer demand, many are still reluctant about privacy and security of their medical information. Nearly four in 10 (38 percent) of consumers surveyed are very concerned about the privacy and security of personal health information. Another 24 percent said they had no reservations about it; interestingly, women over the age of 65 and men between the ages of 18 to 24 were least risk-averse to sharing personal health information online. Women are also more likely than men to seek online access to doctors, medical records and tools. They are also more interested in using secure websites and slightly more trusting of the information they locate about care and treatment through independent health-related websites, the study revealed.

“Information technologies that support consumers in becoming more informed decision-makers and purchasers of health care resources, and facilitate transactions in ways that improve efficiency and lower costs, have tremendous potential to improve our health care system,” said Russ Rudish, vice chairman and U.S. industry leader of Deloitte LLP’s Health Care Provider industry group. “We have developed tools and services to help our clients navigate vendor selection and plan for implementations. This also requires helping to ensure proper certification criteria are met and necessary requirements are fulfilled to qualify for stimulus package grants.”

Additional findings from the survey:

  • Six in 10 endorse government establishment of standards for how medical information is collected, stored and exchanged.
  • Four in 10 (42 percent) favor increasing government funding and incentives to support the adoption of electronic medical records by doctors, hospitals and health plans (2 in 10 oppose). Support is highest among Gen Y (44 percent); Gen X (43 percent); and seniors (43 percent).
  • Sixty-eight percent are interested in home or remote monitoring devices that permit them to monitor their conditions and electronically report it to their physicians; interest is particularly high among seniors (78 percent) and those with chronic conditions (75 percent).
  • Thirty percent of prescription medication users say they purchased medications online or through mail order in the previous 12 months; Medicaid enrollees were the most likely to report this (37 percent).
  • Forty-one percent of all consumers say they’d be likely to order medications online or by mail order if they were to develop a health condition that required regular medication.

According to additional Deloitte analysis, “Reducing Costs While Improving the U.S. Health Care System: The Health Care Reform Pyramid” (www.deloitte.com/us/healthreformpyramid), the investment of $50 billion for HIT over five years, to which the administration has pledged $19 billion in the stimulus package, has the potential to achieve net-present-value (NPV) savings as high as $90 billion over 10 years. The advantages of personalized medicine in tandem with comparative effectiveness and HIT could achieve NPV savings as high as $140 billion over 10 years.

“Hospital executives will need to work side by side with their physicians to kick the tires on selecting a system’s clinical knowledge management tools and exploring how algorithms are designed, how patient values are incorporated and interpreted into prompts to doctors and nurses,” added Rudish. “Ultimately, it’s the clinical processes – diagnoses and treatments – where the ROI for EHRs will be achieved – or not. This will depend on how well clinicians engage using EHRs as tools to improve the delivery of patient care.”

Methodology

A nationally representative sample of 4,001 American adults, ages 18 and older, was surveyed between October 2 and 10, 2008, using a web-based questionnaire. The results were weighted to assure proper proportional representation to the nation’s population, as reflected in the U.S. Census, with respect to age, gender, income, race/ethnicity and geography. The margin of error around the U.S. point estimates is +/- 1.6 percent at the .95 confidence level.

Report: 2009 Survey for Health Care Consumers (www.deloitte.com/us/2009consumersurvey)

Overview: Deloitte Center for Health Solutions (www.deloitte.com/us/healthsolutions)

Overview: Deloitte’s Involvement at HIMSS (www.deloitte.com/us/HIMSS09)

Profile: Paul Keckley, Ph.D (www.deloitte.com/us/paulkeckley)

Profile: Russ Rudish (www.deloitte.com/us/russrudish)

Source: Deloitte


First-of-its-Kind Solution Helps Ensure Physicians Can Access Critical Patient Information Outside the Office

From the floor of the HIMSS09 Annual Conference & Exhibition, Allscripts introduced Allscripts Remote(TM), a new iPhone(TM) native application that provides physicians virtually anytime, anywhere access to and control of Allscripts Electronic Health Records (EHR).

With Allscripts Remote, physicians can now safely make critical medical decisions even when they are away from the office, with all relevant information available on the one device they keep closest – their phone. Also available for the Apple iPod touch(R), Allscripts Remote delivers an interactive connection to the award-winning Allscripts Enterprise(R) and Professional(R) Electronic Health Records. Capabilities include quick access to real-time patient summary information; fast communication to local hospital emergency rooms; convenient ePrescribing to the patient’s regular pharmacy; and real-time access to all the information a physician needs to make decisions, including medical history, lab results and medications.

“Allscripts Remote has transformed the way I practice medicine outside of the office,” said Larry Glazerman, M.D., Assistant Professor and Director of Minimally Invasive Gynecologic Surgery at the University of South Florida College of Medicine in Tampa, Florida. “When I get a call from a patient at 3 a.m., I no longer have to guess who she is, what medications she’s on and what problems she has because I have all the information at my fingertips instantly. If I need to send her to the ER, I can dictate some notes by talking into the phone, and send them to the ER physician with the push of a button. I can also check my schedule and sign off on tasks virtually anywhere, at any time. Allscripts Remote is an amazing product that is making my practice safer as well as more convenient.”

The ease, convenience and functionality of Allscripts Remote creates an entirely new experience for the physician – the ability to practice medicine on iPhone(TM) or iPod touch(R) in a fast, efficient and intuitive manner. Busy physicians can save precious personal time by being more productive during down time without having to carry a laptop or manage Internet connections.

“Physicians are quick to adopt technology that delivers clear benefits to their patients while making their own lives easier, and Allscripts Remote delivers on both counts,” said Glen Tullman, Chief Executive Officer of Allscripts. “For any physician who uses iPhone or plans to, there’s no better way to connect to real-time information and new capabilities that not only make it easier for them to make informed clinical decisions, but save them time. It’s all about connecting.”

Stanley Crane, Director of Innovation for Allscripts, said Allscripts Remote “redefines what it is to be connected via virtually anytime, anywhere access to information.” Just as the Blackberry was designed to maximize email access, so Allscripts remote takes advantage of iPhone(TM) graphical capabilities to provide fast, easy access to the Electronic Health Record. “If you end up in the emergency room, this is the product that you hope your doctor has,” Crane added.

According to Manhattan Research, physicians are adopting mobile technology at a faster rate than the general public. In September 2008, the research firm reported that 54 percent of U.S. physicians own a PDA or smartphone. Meanwhile, Diffusion Group has predicted that 70 percent of physicians will own a smartphone or PDA by 2011.

As more physicians purchase an iPhone(TM) and take advantage of new federal incentives for Electronic Health Record adoption – up to $64,000 over five years – Allscripts Remote offers a convenient method for connecting to their EHR.

Patients also benefit from Allscripts Remote because the solution improves continuity of care with a medical summary faxed to the ER and annotated with the provider’s instructions, and provides safer medications with accurate medication and allergy lists combined with drug interaction checking.

Allscripts Remote works with Allscripts Enterprise and Professional Electronic Health Records and can be downloaded on the App Store for any iPhone(TM) or iPod touch(R) (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=302920636&mt=8). A free product demonstration can also be downloaded on the App Store, which lets you browse applications and download them directly to your iPhone.

Demonstrations of Allscripts Remote are available at McCormick Place during the HIMSS09 Conference & Exhibition, April 4-8, by visiting the Allscripts booth (#1303).

Allscripts

Allscripts uses innovation technology to bring health to healthcare. More than 150,000 physicians, 700 hospitals and nearly 7,000 post-acute and homecare organizations utilize Allscripts to improve the health of their patients and their bottom line. The company’s award-winning solutions include electronic health records, electronic prescribing, revenue cycle management, practice management, document management, medication services, hospital care management, emergency department information systems and homecare automation. Allscripts is the brand name of Allscripts-Misys Healthcare Solutions, Inc. To learn more, visit www.allscripts.com.


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