TUBA CITY, Ariz. –Tuba City Regional Health Care Corporation (TCRHCC) is the first Medical Center on the Navajo Nation to implement a comprehensive Electronic Medical Records (EMR), including Laboratory and Radiology.
Last month, TCRHCC EMR Implementation Team announced the medical center has reached Stage 4 of the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) adoption recognition from HIMSS Analytics, an achievement shared by only 10.5% of hospitals in the United States. John Ruehle, IT Consultant said, “Remember, we have achieved this in just 30 months.”
“TCRHCC realizes the importance of the implementation and integration of our E.M.R. along with quality outcomes,” said Lynette Bonar, Chief of Operations at TCRHCC. “We are fortunate to build our clinical systems on a personal level with our ancillary (lab, pharmacy, revenue cycle) commercial off the shelf (COTS) systems.”
TCRHCC Inpatient and Outpatient, Pharmacy, and Radiology services have implemented health care technology to support high levels of automated patient care delivery, which will lead to strong system usage and patient safety.
HIMSS Analytics developed the Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model (EMRAM) in 2005 as a methodology for evaluating the progress and impact of EMR systems for hospitals in the HIMSS Analytic Database (HIMSS Analytics, 2011).
The criteria for the HIMSS Analytics EMR Adoption are extensive and rigorous, and most hospitals have achieved only Stage 1, 2, or 3 of the stages. HIMSS Analytics receives information from those hospitals, which participate in the EMRAM study, and then assigns benchmarks to those hospitals (HIMSS Analytics, 2011).
Bonar encourages continuous quality improvements and says, “Our real time priorities are quality, safety, and value added care with our E.M.R development, as well as our first steps toward developing our Accountable Care Organization (ACO).”
TCRHCC at a Stage 4, is not far from reaching Stage 5 by the end July.
Reuhle says, “Stage 5 means TCRHCC will have implemented Pharmacy and ER with ALERT, and accomplished the closed loop medication where eMar and bar coding are integrated with CPOE and Pharmacy.”
The closed loop medication stage requires CPOE, a pharmacy management system, and an electronic medication administration record with bar coding to ensure the Five Rights (Right Patient, Right Drug, Right Time, Right Dose, and Right Route) of medication administration are executed and monitored via automation.
Stage 5 will put TCRHCC Medical Center among only 4.5% of hospitals achieving this level on the EMR Adoption Recognition.
TCRHCC Implementation Team expects the Medical Center to reach Stage 6 by late December. Stage 6 is an achievement shared by only 3.2% of hospitals in the United States.
Stage 6 entails Physician documentation (structured templates and full Radiology Information System). This puts TCRHCC in the best position to capture and share data which will be necessary to support the model of EMR.
Next year, as TCRHCC prepares for Stage 7, the Medical Center will be a step closer to:
- Deliver patient care without the use of paper charts
- Are able to share patient information by sending secure standardized summary record transactions to other care providers
- Use their vast database of clinical information to drive improved care delivery performance, patient safety clinical decision support, and outcomes using business intelligence solutions
- Are best practice examples of how to implement sophisticated EMR environments that fully engage their clinicians.
Reuhle says, “Once we reach stage 7, we will be eligible to apply for the HIMSS Davies Award of Excellence for the implementation and value from Information Technology in Healthcare, specifically in E.H.R.
Since 1994 only 29 organizations have received this award (HIMSS, 2011).
# # # #
