U.S. News & World Report Announces 2012 Most Connected Hospitals

WASHINGTON, July 17, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- U.S. News & World Report today announced its 2012 list of the Most Connected Hospitals. The new list identifies 156 U.S. News-ranked hospitals that are significantly advanced in the adoption of electronic medical record systems.

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Over the past few years, the electronic medical record—or EMR—has vaulted into the daily routine of medical professionals throughout the country. The promise of the EMR is widely heralded.  It could prove to make the delivery of healthcare safer and more efficient and provide healthcare providers and patients with better access to health data.

The federal government, through its incentive payments to physicians and hospitals that demonstrate "meaningful use" of EMR's, is playing no small part in spurring the technology's adoption. A small but growing number of hospitals have embraced EMR's beyond the government benchmarks.

An even smaller subset of those hospitals also succeed in delivering the superior care that U.S. News recognizes in its Best Hospitals. For the second year in a row, U.S. News has published a list of the Most Connected Hospitals to highlight institutions that are both digitally forward and clinically excellent.

The 156 institutions on this year's Most Connected Hospitals list have met three challenging standards that put them in the vanguard of centers leading medicine into the era of electronic medical records.

Each is distinguished by having captured a national ranking in the 2012-13 U.S. News Best Hospitals and/or Best Children's Hospitals rankings or by having earned the designation of "high-performing" in one or more medical specialties. And each hospital, or one or more of its major units—such as a children's hospital within the larger institution—is a leader in moving to electronic medical records.

The determination of which hospitals are leaders in EMR use was based on two criteria: First, a hospital had to have satisfied by July 10, 2012, current U.S. Department of Health and Human Services requirements for achieving "meaningful use" of a system of electronic medical records that can be used for e-prescribing, for electronic exchange of medical records, for supplying medical data to patients and for providing data that can be used to monitor clinical quality.

Second, it had to have met strict criteria for EMR use set by HIMSS Analytics, a division of the nonprofit Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society that analyzes use of health information technology. HIMSS Analytics scores hospitals' adoption of electronic medical records on a scale from Stage 0 (no use of EMRs) to Stage 7 (full use). Only hospitals at Stage 6 or Stage 7 as of July 10, 2012, were eligible to appear on the Most Connected Hospitals list.

The complete list of 2012 Most Connected Hospitals can be found at http://www.usnews.com/connected.

In an exclusive arrangement, the 2012 list of Most Connected Hospitals is being sponsored by Dell.

Media contact: [email protected]

About U.S. News & World Report
U.S. News & World Report is a multi-platform publisher of news and analysis, which includes the digital-only U.S. News Weekly magazine, www.usnews.com, and www.rankingsandreviews.com. Focusing on Health, Personal Finance, Education, Travel, Cars, and Public Service/Opinion, U.S. News has earned a reputation as the leading provider of service news and information that improves the quality of life of its readers. U.S. News & World Report's signature franchise includes its News You Can Use® brand of journalism and its annual "Best" series of consumer web guides and publications that include rankings of colleges, graduate schools, hospitals, mutual funds, health plans, and more.

About Dell
Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) is among the leading providers of IT services to the healthcare industry providing providers, payers and pharmaceutical companies with leading business and technology solutions that extend from the point of care to the data center.  Dell's integrated business process and technology solutions help hospitals maximize efficiency and reimbursement; achieve clinical excellence and create communities of practice to more efficiently deliver patient care.  Learn more at http://content.dell.com/us/en/healthcare/healthcare-solutions.aspx?~ck=bt&~ck=mn.

SOURCE U.S. News & World Report