Cerner to provide AORN SYNTEGRITY SPF for streamlining EHR perioperative documentation

Association of periOperative Registered NursesJan 30 2010

Helping to streamline electronic documentation processes for perioperative care, CSC (NYSE: CSC) and the Association of periOperative Registered Nurses (AORN) announced today that Cerner (Nasdaq: CERN), a global supplier of healthcare solutions, will be the first to provide AORN SYNTEGRITY™ Standardized Perioperative Framework (SPF) within a surgery and anesthesia management clinical information system. With AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM, the amount of clinical staff time needed to configure and support electronic health record (EHR) perioperative documentation can be reduced by as much as 80 percent.

“The combination of AORN SYNTEGRITY™ Standardized Perioperative Framework and the Cerner Millennium SurgiNet solution further improves the safety and efficiency of hospital operating rooms.”

Currently, there are no standardized guidelines for recording patient data in perioperative systems. Hospitals invest valuable clinical resources in the development and management of their own guidelines, workflow processes and training documents required for electronic documentation. AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM is designed to complement EHR programs. By incorporating the AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM guidelines into the Cerner SurgiNet^® solution, hospitals can reduce the time spent developing individual processes and guidelines and can ensure that perioperative care documentation is aligned with AORN recommendations.

“By bringing AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM to Cerner’s clients, we can provide reliable documentation options for many operational and clinical evaluations, and help hospitals gather information for benchmarking that can be used to proactively determine changes needed to improve patient care,” said Deward Watts, president of CSC’s Healthcare Group. “The combination of AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM Standardized Perioperative Framework and the Cerner Millennium SurgiNet solution further improves the safety and efficiency of hospital operating rooms.”

Developed by CSC and AORN, SYNTEGRITY^TM helps streamline the capture of critical patient data for perioperative care in hospitals, outpatient facilities and ambulatory surgery centers. The framework enables health practitioners to quickly identify and document patient care elements across the continuum of perioperative care, including preadmission, preoperative, intraoperative and postoperative phases. AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM also includes data fields necessary for reporting relevant operational, quality and regulatory information.

“Creating an electronic health record for every patient by 2014 is a big part of President Obama’s agenda, and AORN SYNTEGRITY™ Standardized Perioperative Framework provides a template for how electronic and standardized documentation can become widespread in not only surgical departments but across the healthcare continuum,” said AORN executive director Linda Groah, RN, MSN, CNOR, FAAN. “With today’s announcement, Cerner is helping hospitals come closer to fulfilling this federal requirement and guiding perioperative care professionals into the future of healthcare.”

AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM incorporates AORN’s standardized nursing vocabulary, the Perioperative Nursing Data Set (PNDS), and aligns with clinical standards, accreditation specifications and regulatory requirements to promote ongoing compliance and consistent patient care. Data derived from AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM documentation can be used to support benchmarking activities and will enable perioperative care practitioners to measure outcomes and evaluate the quality and effectiveness of care.

“Incorporating the AORN SYNTEGRITY™ Standardized Perioperative Framework into the Cerner SurgiNet solution, creates efficiency in documentation workflow, making it a valuable tool for hospitals to access perioperative information quickly and to effectively monitor compliance,” said Bryce Turnbull, Cerner perioperative solutions managing director. “These enhanced capabilities will help hospitals make significant improvements in the quality of patient data captured during the surgical experience.”

Hospitals can obtain more information at the annual AORN Congress (www.aorncongress.org) taking place March 13 through 18 in Denver, Colo. Details on AORN SYNTEGRITY™ are also available at www.aornSyntegrity.org.

CSC’s Global Healthcare Group, which serves healthcare providers, health plans, pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers, and allied industries around the world, is a global leader in transforming the healthcare industry through the effective use of information to improve healthcare outcomes, decision-making and operating efficiency. AORN SYNTEGRITY^TM is an integral part of CSC’s portfolio to transform healthcare with better information for better decisions. By having access to better information, healthcare professionals can make better decisions, which improves patient care and helps save lives and money.