Blue Mountain Hospital Selects Enterprise System from Prognosis HIS

HOUSTON, April 11, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Blue Mountain Hospital has used an electronic clinical system since its inception in 2009 – but recently announced plans to swap out its original technology with an enterprise clinical and financial solution from Prognosis Health Information Systems.

"We were lucky to start out as a completely electronic hospital. But we realize that the system we are using simply is not meeting all of our needs," says Jeremy Lyman, CFO at the 11-bed, Blanding, Utah-based critical access hospital, which provides comprehensive healthcare to nearly 15,000 residents of San Juan County in addition to potentially hundreds of thousands of visitors to nearby Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona. "As the federal government rolls out the EHR adoption incentive program, we realize we need to do something different but don't want to go through upgrades and customization of the existing system.  We decided to look for a better option that will quickly meet the government's meaningful use requirements and most importantly improve patient care."

Leaders from across the hospital searched for a system that can deliver the desired clinical, financial and operational results. After several months of research and in-depth evaluation of several alternatives, the team chose the fully integrated clinical and financial Prognosis HIS system because it:  

Provides a fully integrated computing experience. With one comprehensive system providing both clinical and financial functionality, the hospital expects to improve efficiency and eliminate all of the cumbersome manual transfer of data between disparate systems.

"With the integrated system, it will be so easy to get access to the information we need," Lyman says. "When systems are not adequately integrated, you have to log-in and out of multiple systems to get data – and it becomes a cumbersome process. It's frustrating because you know the data is there but it is just too difficult to use to move your organization forward."

Is built on 21st century technology. Blue Mountain leaders wanted a system built on a leading technology platform.  Many older client-server or mainframe systems are web-enabled, which means that applications have been "adapted" for use over the Internet, but the Prognosis applications are built on a web-native platform, which means they can fully exploit the power of the Internet. 

Delivers a user-friendly end-user experience.  "Most of our clinicians and staff members routinely use computers and Internet applications for personal reasons – and expect to tap into the same user-friendly experience at work.  They expect to be able to navigate the system just as easily as they navigate the Internet at home," Lyman says. The hospital's previous system offered a cumbersome, hard-to-navigate interface, while the Prognosis system is extremely intuitive.

Is affordable. Even though hospital leaders expect to recoup much of the system's costs by qualifying for incentive funds, Lyman points out that purchase and maintenance costs still factored into the decision.  "We didn't make our decision based on cost. However, we were happy that the system we believe will provide the highest value was one of the most reasonably priced," Lyman says.

Offers fast speed to value with rapid implementation approach. "Prognosis understands rural health, is well organized and very responsive.  The company has an effective implementation process with a proven track record of successful implementations. We are very comfortable doing business with Prognosis because we expect the company will be here serving rural and community hospitals for a long time," Lyman says.

Blue Mountain leaders expect to implement the system in just four months and have targeted mid June for the "go-live" date, positioning the hospital to be on track to meet meaningful use requirements by the end of 2012.

"Because Blue Mountain had already implemented another EHR system, leaders at the hospital were intimately aware of what is needed to move forward," says Ramsey Evans, President & CEO of Prognosis. "We are honored they selected Prognosis and our enterprise system. We're confident our system will support Blue Mountain as it continues to improve clinical care in rural Utah – and as the hospital moves toward achieving meaningful use in 2012." 

About Prognosis Health Information Systems
Prognosis Health Information Systems (PHIS), Houston, is committed to utilizing advanced 21st-Century technologies to help healthcare providers significantly improve the quality, safety and efficiency of patient care while also achieving better financial results. PHIS enables rural and community hospitals to utilize pure browser-based electronic health record (EHR) and financial systems designed to be fully operational in less than six months at a predictable, affordable cost. For more information, visit www.prognosisHIS.com. Follow us on Twitter (@PrognosisHIS).

SOURCE Prognosis Health Information Systems