ICW America and Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island team up to offer an interoperable personal health record

Jul 9 2007

ICW America (ICW), a leading international e-Health provider and the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University's Center for Primary Care and Prevention (the Center) at Memorial Hospital of Rhode Island, a leading research and teaching institution, have reached agreement to enter into a strategic collaboration to "develop and test a 21st century patient-centered, e-Health model of care".

The key objective of the strategic collaboration is to show evidence of improvement in quality of care and patient safety by linking, and in this case, actually integrating a patient owned and controlled personal health record (PHR) to their provider's electronic medical record (EMR). The collaboration will present the opportunity for a demonstration project that will support, promote and illustrate the value of ICW's integrated LifeSensor PHR. When integrated, LifeSensor becomes a trusted source of patient health information for providers, and serves as the patient's "source system".

Jeremy P. Coote, CEO of ICW America stated, "ICW has been very impressed with the environment of quality improvement supported by Brown and Memorial at the Center. Equally impressive is their record of accomplishment in research and innovation, including clear leadership in embracing health information technology. The Center's orientation toward improving the patient-physician relationship and fully involving the patient and the patient's family in clinical care closely matches ICW's vision."

Dr. Charles Eaton, M.D. M.S., a Professor of Family Medicine at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and Director of the Center, is spearheading this initiative. "LifeSensor, as an integrated PHR, fully supports the concept that healthcare providers and patients are equal partners in monitoring and managing patients' health. The model we envision creating with ICW will enable and empower patients to take more responsibility for their health. With our program design, we believe that we may actually prevent illness or certainly lessen the seriousness and impact of diseases."

Eaton further stated that an integrated PHR-EMR will foster better patient-doctor communications and promote better health outcomes between doctor visits. "Using LifeSensor in this program is not meant to replace the traditional doctor's office practice but rather enhance and improve upon it."

In addition to the integration of the PHR-EMR within the initial program objectives, the collaboration will also set up the foundational capabilities to enable connectivity for a broader, multi-stakeholder and interoperable regional health information exchange. ICW's technology is capable of connecting existing, but isolated healthcare information systems without requiring the replacement of existing software. By utilizing ICW's e-Health Framework and other service oriented architecture solutions, a true interoperable platform is envisioned for fully authorized and secure information sharing among and between appropriate stakeholders in healthcare delivery – including the patient.

http://www.icw-global.com and http://www.LifeSensor.com