Stanford Hospital & Clinics Awarded Stage 7 HIMSS Designation for Electronic Medical Record System
HIMSS Analytics Stage 7 Award recognizes most advanced electronic medical record environment
JANUARY 25, 2010
Stanford Hospital & Clinics (SHC) has achieved the highest level designation, known as Stage 7, for its electronic medical record system from the HIMSS Analytics Database.
Stanford Hospital & Clinics (SHC) announced today that it has received the highest level designation for its electronic medical record system from the HIMSS Analytics Database, the industry organization focused on the use of information technology in health care. Stanford Hospital is the fourth healthcare organization and one of only six nationwide among more than 5,000 in the HIMSS Analytics Database to achieve this top-level designation, known as “Stage 7.”
HIMSS Analytics developed the seven-stage EMR Adoption Model in 2005 as a methodology for evaluating the progress and impact of electronic medical record systems for hospitals in the HIMSS Analytics™ Database. Currently, less than 1% of U.S. hospitals have attained even six of the seven stages.
The Stanford Hospital & Clinics top-level designation was reached as the result of a major four-year initiative that began in 2006. To receive the Stage 7 Award, a healthcare organization must advance through all previous six stages and be validated by HIMSS. This process includes a site visit conducted by an executive from HIMSS Analytics and two independent chief information officers to ensure an unbiased evaluation of the Stage 7 environments.
“In a little less than four years, we advanced to Stage 7. To do so in that time period is an extraordinary effort accomplished through support and planning as a team across the entire hospital and clinics. For the first time in Stanford Hospital’s 50-year history, we are all using the same holistic set of tools that allow virtually the entire patient experience to be organized, documented and managed from a single integrated system,” said SHC Chief Information Officer Carolyn Byerly.
Delivering patient care without the use of paper charts provides a tremendous advantage to patients and their physicians because a patient's medical record - with appropriate security measures to protect confidentiality - is available anywhere, anytime, across the entire hospital and clinics system.
Stage 7 represents the most advanced electronic patient record environment. The criteria for Stage 7 designation require that a hospital must be able to:
- Deliver patient care without the use of paper charts
- Share patient information by sending secure record transactions to other care providers
- Use its database of clinical information to drive improved care delivery performance, patient safety clinical decision support, and outcomes using business intelligence solutions
- Serve as a best-practice example for how to implement sophisticated electronic medical record environments that fully engage clinicians
“Reaching Stage 7 is a remarkable accomplishment and a testament to Stanford Hospital & Clinics’ innovation and technology leadership,” said SHC Chief Medical Information Officer Pravene Nath, MD. “One of the reasons that few hospitals reach even Stage 6 is the requirement for completely paperless physician documentation. The result is that our physician notes and other clinical data are accessible anywhere, anytime, regardless of the care setting—whether it’s the Emergency Department, inpatient units, outpatient clinics or other environments.”
According to a study published in the March 25, 2009, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, adoption rates for electronic medical records among the nation’s hospitals have been extremely low, indicating that the healthcare industry has a long way to go before achieving electronic records interoperability
Only 1.5% of nonfederal U.S. hospitals use a comprehensive electronic medical record system and only about 8% use a basic system in at least one unit that includes physician or nurse notes, according to the study. The study’s authors noted while many hospitals have some pieces of an electronic medical system very few have put it all together into a system that works across the hospital.
Stage 7 enables a healthcare organization to support true sharing and use of health information by consumers and providers alike. In addition, Nath noted that Stanford Hospital will soon be able to “rapidly move clinical data in and out of our system so that it is available at other healthcare facilities where and when our patients need it, with the appropriate security and privacy controls.”
Achieving a paperless environment represents a best practice example of how to implement a sophisticated EMR environment that fully engages medical staff, according to HIMSS. Stanford Hospital will continue to build on advances the new electronic medical record system makes possible.
“We view this as only the beginning of the journey,” noted SHC Chief Medical Officer Kevin Tabb, MD. ”We now have tools and platforms that will allow us to go forward and implement changes in delivery of care that many of us have talked about for years, from standardizing best practices of care to analyzing information about patient outcomes. The future looks very exciting and will benefit our patients in ways that we can only begin to imagine today.”
About Stanford Hospital & Clinics
Stanford Hospital & Clinics is known worldwide for advanced treatment of complex disorders in areas such as cardiovascular care, cancer treatment, neurosciences, surgery, and organ transplants. Consistently ranked among the top institutions in the U.S. News & World Report annual list of "America's Best Hospitals," Stanford Hospital & Clinics is internationally recognized for translating medical breakthroughs into the care of patients. It is part of the Stanford University Medical Center, along with the Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford. For more information, visit http://stanfordmedicine.org.