Little Rock, Arkansas –  June, 2019.  Right now, an estimated 6.7 million Americans are suffering with chronic, non-healing wounds.  With this problem at hand, the State Health Alliance for Records Exchange (SHARE) is helping raise awareness of chronic wounds by observing Wound Care Awareness Week June 3-7.  SHARE is connected to many primary care and specialty care physicians and clinics that are educating patients and the public about the chronic wound epidemic and advanced wound care solutions.

The Problem: Millions of people throughout the U.S. suffer every day from an epidemic that is expected to grow over the next decade:  Chronic wounds. This problem drastically affects people by diminishing their overall quality of life and potentially decreasing life expectancy if left untreated. Not only are wounds painful, dangerous and scary, but it is also estimated that wounds cost the healthcare industry over $50 billion a year according to Healogics.

Non-healing wounds affect approximately 6.7 million people in the U.S. and the amount is expected to rise at a rate of two percent annually over the next decade. An aging population and increasing rates of diseases and conditions, such as diabetes, obesity and vascular disease, contribute to the chronic wound epidemic. If left untreated, chronic wounds can lead to diminished quality of life and possible amputation of the affected limb according to Healogics. Approximately 30 percent of untreated chronic wounds result in amputation. Five years’ post-amputation the mortality rate is 50 percent.

The collaborative specialty care clinic partners below are working to create a better state of health for Arkansas. With better data exchange such as admission, discharge and transfer (ADT) information, laboratory results, radiology reports, pathology reports, progress notes, discharge summaries, vitals, allergies, diagnosis and conditions are assisting care teams across Arkansas in better care coordination and transitions of care.

• Arkansas Children's Hospital Burn and Wound Care Clinic in Little Rock
• Arkansas Children's Northwest- Endocrine Clinic in Springdale
• CHI St. Vincent Wound Care Center – Hot Springs
• Conway Regional Wound Healing Center in Conway
• Magnolia Regional Medical Center Surgical/Wound Care Center in Magnolia
• North Arkansas Regional Medical Center Wound Care Clinic in Harrison
• NEA Baptist Clinic Wound Care – Windover Clinic in Jonesboro
• Stone County Medical Center Wound Center in Mountain View
• Saline Memorial Wound Healing Center in Benton
• University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences Endocrine/Podiatry Clinic in Little Rock
• White River Medical Center Wound Healing Center in Batesville
• Wound Care Center at Jefferson Regional Medical Center in Pine Bluff

Continued collaboration with the Statewide Health Information Exchange reflects that coordinated care is extending across a much wider spectrum of facilities than ever before.  SHARE’s mission is to provide better information to support high quality patient care for the State’s health care community. By increasing data in the health information exchange (HIE), SHARE supplies a more comprehensive health care picture to a patient’s treating physician and care team.

Little Rock, Arkansas June 2019 – The State Health Alliance for Records Exchange (SHARE) announces a continued partnership with the Mississippi County Hospital System in a groundbreaking move that will allow the secure sharing of patient medical records with other SHARE connected physicians and providers throughout the State of Arkansas. This expansion will include South Mississippi County Regional Medical Center, Great River Medical Center, their family medicine, internal medicine and specialty care clinics that provide urology, gynecology, obstetrics, pain and wound care services. Health care providers in Mississippi County (Blytheville & Osceola) and neighboring counties can securely access medical records through SHARE. Patient records will be available around the clock and in real-time, enhancing patient care in the Delta Region.

Patients of Mississippi County Hospital System will benefit from a higher quality of care as a result of this new connection. Now caregivers, family doctors, emergency room physicians, specialists, pharmacies and long-term care facilities can have secure, HIPAA-compliant access to patient records in real time as a SHARE participant.

South Mississippi County Regional Medical Center and Great River Medical Center hospitals see ~43,000 patients that live in Mississippi County in Northeast Arkansas.  SHARE is integrated with both hospitals’ electronic health record (EHR) system, MEDHOST. They are now sending admission, discharge and transfer (ADT) information, laboratory results, radiology reports, pathology reports, vitals, allergies, diagnosis and conditions to assist in better care coordination and transitions of care.  SHARE is also assisting the hospitals in their public health reporting to the Arkansas Department of Health Registries.

Also, SHARE is assisting in real-time 30 day readmissions. The 30-day readmission notification project allows both hospitals to receive a secure message notification when a patient that discharged from their facility, was readmitted into any SHARE participating hospital within a 30-day timeframe.

Mississippi County Hospital System is home to multiple outpatient clinics that serve the growing needs of their community. They have clinics available for patients looking for an annual wellness exam, planning a preventative procedure, or needs wound care. SHARE is integrated with Athena electronic medical record (EMR) system and is receiving admission, discharge and transfer (ADT) information, laboratory results, radiology reports, pathology reports, progress notes, discharge summaries, vitals, allergies, diagnosis and conditions.

The following Mississippi County Hospital System clinics are fully integrated with SHARE through the Athena EMR system interface:

• Community Health Specialist (MCHS)
• Great River Family Clinic (MCHS)
• Great River Pain Clinic (MCHS)
• Great River Urology
• Great River Women's Clinic (MCHS)
• Great River Wound Healing Clinic (MCHS)
• Mississippi County Primary Care Physicians (MCHS)
• Practitioner Family Care
• Ashley A. Chimere MD

SHARE also routes the results from both hospital systems that are on MEDHOST to their Athena clinics in order for the providers to have their patients results in their local environment in real-time. SHARE’s continued mission is to provide better information to support high quality patient care for the state’s health care community. By increasing data in the health information exchange (HIE), SHARE supplies a more comprehensive health care picture to a patient’s treating physician and care team.

About Mississippi County Hospital System

Mission: To restore, maintain, and improve the health of everyone in the communities they serve.

Vision: To inspire hope in all who seek their help by offering the kind of care they would expect for their own family.

Great River Medical Center

Great River Medical Center (GRMC) is a full-service hospital with 99 beds that is committed to keeping quality health care closer to home for the community. The hospital offers:

 

South Mississippi County Regional Medical Center

South Mississippi County Regional Medical Center(SMC) is a critical access hospital with 25 beds that is committed to keeping quality health care closer to home for the community. The hospital offers:

 

For more info, visit https://www.mchsys.org

 

 

 

 

 

Little Rock, AR. May 2019. More than 60 south Arkansas and northern Louisiana health care providers continue to securely access patient health records from Magnolia Regional Medical Center located in Magnolia, Arkansas through SHARE, Arkansas’ only statewide health information exchange (HIE). The data sharing builds a more complete medical record for communities and individuals. With the connection to the HIE, it results in fewer repeated tests, better diagnosis and monitoring of chronic conditions and more comprehensive patient health record.

The continued collaboration with partners such as Magnolia Regional Medical Center reflects that coordinated care is extending across a much wider spectrum of facilities than ever before.  Magnolia Regional Medical Center, that serves south Arkansas and northern Louisiana, commitment is the first of many from health system organizations across state, making the community’s ability to deliver efficient and effective healthcare.

Magnolia Regional Medical Center is home to multiple outpatient clinics that serve the growing needs of their community. Whether a patient is looking for an annual wellness exam, planning a preventative procedure, or needs specialty infusions, they have a clinic to serve you. The following specialty clinics are sending Admission, Discharge and Transfer (ADT) information, Laboratory Results, Radiology Reports, Pathology Reports, Progress Notes, Discharge Summaries, Vitals, Allergies, Diagnosis and Conditions to assist in better care coordination and transitions of care.   

SHARE is a secure electronic health information exchange (HIE) dedicated to serving Arkansas’ 75 counties. Our suite of services allows health care professionals to securely and rapidly share records across institutions and practices, making patient information available wherever and whenever needed to provide the highest quality care. Patients benefit from fewer repeated tests, missing records and errors, while receiving more informed care during office visits and emergencies.

SHARE’s mission is to provide better information to support high quality patient care for the State’s health care community. By increasing data in the health information exchange (HIE), SHARE supplies a more comprehensive health care picture to a patient’s treating physician and care team.

About Magnolia Regional Medical Center

Magnolia Regional Medical Center is a non-profit, city owned, Acute Care Hospital. The hospital has been in continuous operation since 1939 and is licensed to operate 49 beds. In February 2010, a new facility opened replacing the original 1939 building and additions. The hospital continues to serve a diverse population in Columbia County and a large part of Southwest Arkansas including neonatal, pediatric, obstetric, adult, and geriatric patients.

Magnolia Regional Medical Center is located near the center of the City of Magnolia, eighteen miles from the Louisiana border, in the southwest corner of the state. It serves as the sole community provider of medical care for a thirty-five-mile radius. The primary service area is Columbia County, but receives patients from Lafayette, Nevada, Ouachita, and Union counties, as well as residents of Northern Louisiana.

Learn more about MRMC: https://magnoliarmc.org/

May 2019 Little Rock, Arkansas. The State Health Alliance for Records Exchange (SHARE) is proud to partner with Arkansas Children’s Northwest (ACNW) hospital and clinics that are now sending data to Arkansas’ only Statewide Health Information Exchange (HIE). Continuity of Care Documents (CCDs) are being shared with referral providers ranging from endocrinology to orthopedics. As the region’s first and only children’s hospital, Arkansas Children’s Northwest (ACNW) offers easy access to complete pediatric healthcare. Their team is available 24/7 and includes an emergency department just for children. ACNW simply delivers care close to home for more than 200,000 children in 11 counties in Northwest Arkansas. SHARE is assisting Arkansas Children’s Northwest in transforming the health of children.

The Arkansas Children’s Northwest campus is 233,613 square feet of inpatient beds, emergency care, surgical services, diagnostic services and clinical space. The campus also includes nature trails and gardens for patients and their families, as well as a helipad for the Angel One Transport team.

With a full team of board-certified and fellowship-trained pediatric specialists, ACNW provides a complete range of services for children of all ages, including:

Arkansas Children’s Northwest hospital and specialty clinics are sending Continuity of Care Documents (CCDs) that include: Admission, Discharge and Transfer (ADT) information, Laboratory Results, Radiology Reports, Pathology Reports, Progress Notes, Discharge Summaries, Vitals, Allergies, Diagnosis and Conditions to assist in better care coordination and transitions of care.

About Arkansas Children’s

Arkansas Children’s, Inc. is the only health care system in the state solely dedicated to caring for children, which allows the organization to uniquely shape the landscape of pediatric care in Arkansas. The system includes a 336-bed hospital in Little Rock with the state’s only pediatric Level 1 Trauma Center, burn center, Level 4 neonatal intensive care and pediatric intensive care, and a nationally-recognized children’s research institute. It is one the 25 largest children’s hospitals in the United States and is nationally ranked by U.S. News World & Report in pulmonology, neonatal care, cardiology and heart surgery and urology. Arkansas Children’s Northwest Arkansas in Springdale includes 233,613 square feet of inpatient beds, emergency care, clinic rooms and diagnostic services. Arkansas Children’s also blankets the state with outreach programs that include telemedicine, mobile health and school-based health solutions. A private nonprofit, Arkansas Children’s boasts an internationally renowned reputation for medical breakthroughs and intensive treatments, unique surgical procedures and forward-thinking research and is committed to providing every child with access to the best care available, regardless of location or resources. Founded as an orphanage, Arkansas Children’s has championed children by making them better today and healthier tomorrow for more than 100 years.

For more info, visit www.archildrens.org

 

Health Information Exchange (HIE) is not always understood in our ever changing healthcare landscape.

 

Myth #1 busts a misconception about HIE advancement and consolidation.

 

Interoperability is delivered best in markets that are dominated by one large electronic health record (EHR) System.

 

 

 

While one or two EHR’s may dominate certain markets, in the age of value-based healthcare, patients seek care through a variety of healthcare organizations and locations creating data silos. HIEs can consume, digest and disseminate information from multiple sources and present that information to the hospital, provider and care team in a format they can understand. This means that HIEs provide a normalized, longitudinal clinical record for each patients, incorporating information from all care settings with multiple EHR systems.

 

Myth #2 busts a thought that all patients only see providers within one healthcare organization.

 

Patients in my area only see providers that are associated with our healthcare organization. This is because we provide emergency care, primary care and specialty care.

 

 

 

American patients have seen an average of 18.7 different doctors during their lives, according to a survey conducted by GfK OmniWeb Roper. For patients over 65 years of age, the average increases to 28.4 individual doctors, including primary care, specialists, hospital and urgent care providers.

 

 

 

Myth #3 In an HIE, just sharing data is sufficient. 

 

Many HIEs only share a longitudinal view of a patient data from multiple organizations across the care continuum.

 

 

 

An HIE can alert hospitals and physicians to a patient’s admission, readmission or discharge from an acute care facility, informing the provider’s workflow and helping him/her to better respond to care transitions. This allows a provider to offer timely follow-up care to ensure better care of the patient. Similarly, as value-based care drives requirements for analytics and quality reporting, HIEs can take in data, perform key analytics and deliver reports that help providers increase their quality scores.

Download a printable version here.

 

Little Rock, Arkansas – May, 2019

SHARE is happy to announce our new participant, White Hall Family Medicine Associates. White Hall Family Medicine Associates is the newest independent family medicine clinic to join the SHARE network! This independent provider practice is located in White Hall, Arkansas providing high quality, patient-centered health care. White Hall Family Medicine Associates was founded to provide convenient, complete and compassionate healthcare to their community.

The data exchange service will give the physicians, nurses and care team, in Jefferson County and surrounding areas, secure access to important information such as lab results, updated patient records, vitals, allergies, discharge summaries and demographic information. This ensures every care provider in a patient’s chain of care has consistent and current information, and that their records are more secure and accessible than with paper files.

“With the clinic accessing their patient’s data securing from the SHARE exchange, they will be able to see the bigger picture of their patient’s overall health outside of their clinic. This will include if their patients have been to the hospital or seen a specialist since their last visit, updated test results and progress notes will be right there in their records,” said Justin Villines, HIT Policy Integrator with SHARE. “Patients won’t have to worry about remembering every detail for a primary care visit because their doctors and care team will have a more complete picture of their patients’ health ,” said Villines.

About White Hall Family Medicine Associate:

Your Family … Our Team … Good Health

No matter what age or stage in life, White Hall Family Medicine Associates is committed to providing skilled, quality, comprehensive healthcare. While they continue to keep pace with the latest advancements in medicine, they never forget that each patient is a unique individual. As highly trained, dedicated and experienced physicians, they offer a comprehensive full-service family practice dedicated to providing excellent and compassionate healthcare to patients. As a partner in healthcare, they listen to patients concerns and can help them develop a wellness program that will assist in maintaining optimal health and wellness.

Services

Chronic Illness Management: Chronic illnesses include, but are not limited to, hypertension, hyperlipidemia, diabetes, arthritis and allergies. Such illnesses generally require a lifetime of treatment.

Acute Care: Acute care illnesses include such things as upper respiratory infections, bladder infections, back, neck and other musculoskeletal injuries – maladies that, while possibly severe, are generally brief when properly treated.

Wellness Care: physicians strongly recommend patients have a wellness physical once a year. An annual wellness examination provides physicians with the information necessary to ensure patients maintain a healthy lifestyle, and is also a key to early diagnosis and treatment of potentially serious diseases.

Annual Visits: Include Pap smears (Papanicolaou test), prostate exam, blood work, colon (Colorectal) cancer screening.

Immunizations: Maintaining the recommended immunization schedule is an important aspect of wellness for both adult and pediatric patients.

On-Site Lab & X-Ray:  This includes blood tests, urinalysis, serologies for mono and pregnancy tests. Physicians are able to order chest, bone and joint X-rays on-site and have the results within a reasonable amount of time. The availability of these capabilities in their clinic (and not at a third-party facility) allows them to provide patients with quicker diagnosis and treatment – often while they are being examined.

Find out more here: https://whitehallfamilymedicine.com/

 

• Providers will have an up-to-the-minute view of a patient’s health history at the point of care
• Accessing the Virtual Health Record puts the power of information and collaboration in the hands of the clinician—enabling more accurate diagnoses, faster and more effective treatment, and better outcomes for the patient

Little Rock, Arkansas – May, 2019  SHARE is happy to announce our new participant; Chenal Family Therapy has joined the only statewide health information exchange. Chenal Family Therapy is the newest group of behavioral health clinics to join the SHARE network! With locations in West Little Rock, Conway, North Little Rock, Bryant, White Hall, Rogers (NWA), Hot Springs, De Queen, Cabot, Heber Springs, El Dorado, Fort Smith, Texarkana and Jonesboro. Chenal Family Therapy is encouraging, empowering and equipping patients for a better state of health throughout Arkansas.

Chenal Family Therapy is providing high quality, patient-centered therapy, medication management and counseling. Access to SHARE will give the therapists, nurses and care team, that see patients in over 20 counties in Arkansas, secure access to important health information such as, updated patient records, discharge summaries, medication histories and demographic information. This ensures every care provider in a patient’s chain of care has consistent and current information, and that their health records are more secure and accessible than with paper files being faxed or mailed.

About Chenal Family Therapy:

Chenal Family Therapy is a team of passionate and caring therapists covering in Arkansas, with 15 locations and more to come. They were founded in 2010 by their Practice Director, Ken Clark, MA, LMFT. They do individual, couples and family therapy for kids, teens, and adults, as well as psychological testing services. They also offer psychiatric evaluations, medication management, and registered dietitian services. Healing Relationships through Individual, Couples & Family Therapy is their mission and vision.

Find out more here:

https://www.chenaltherapy.com/

 

Healthcare simply consists of thousands of interlinked processes that result in a very complex system. If we focus on the processes of care one at a time, we can fundamentally change the game and deal with the challenges facing healthcare. Meaningful quality improvement must be data-driven. This is particularly true for quality control in healthcare. You’re basically dead in the water if you try to work with healthcare providers and you don’t have good data. I think everybody recognizes that.

The right data in the right format, at the right time, in the right hands is crucial.  If clinician teams are going to manage care, they need data. They need the right data delivered in the right format, at the right time, and in the right place. And the data must be delivered into the right hands—the clinicians’ care team is involved in operating and improving any given process of care.

If quality improvement is going to work in healthcare—if we are going to realize value—it means, we must engage clinicians. Clinicians (nurses and providers’ care team) are the frontline workers who understand and own the processes of care. But we live in a pristine time. I once received from an email from a physician leader at a leading national delivery system. I’m going to withhold the name of the delivery system, but I can tell you that if you ask knowledgeable people to list of top 10 delivery systems in the country, almost everyone would put the same organization on their list. Despite that, this physician wrote to me lamenting how difficult it was for him to get his peer physicians to see a new future. And in his email, he succinctly described the problem by saying that his physicians were “historically encumbered and demoralized.” And I love the succinctness of his description because what he is basically saying is they’re clinging to the past and are demoralized because they don’t see a new future. And in that short phrase, this very excellent physician leader encapsulated the problem and points us towards the solution.

View the full Spring Newsletter here.

• Empower Health Care Solutions, a Provider-led Arkansas Shared Savings Entity (PASSE) expands connection with SHARE to include real-time ADTs (Admission, Discharge and Transfers)
• Utilizing SHARE in addressing the overall health care needs of Medicaid beneficiaries who have complex behavioral health or intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) service needs
• Use of the Virtual Health Record (VHR) and Secure Messaging (SM) to coordinate and integrate treatment delivery across all of the individual’s providers

Little Rock, Arkansas – April, 2019 The only statewide HIE in Arkansas, State Health Alliance for Records Exchange announce a ground-breaking partnership that will enable more efficient healthcare services for patients across rural Arkansas who have complex behavioral health or intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) service needs.

By enhancing the connection with Empower Health Care Solutions, a Provider-led Arkansas Shared Savings Entity (PASSE) to the statewide HIE network, which includes Admission, Discharge and Transfer (ADT) data exchange, this integration of ADTs will have faster and more complete access to their patients’ most critical health information. The enhanced information access will improve patients’ care coordination, reduce treatment delays and assist with the elimination of unnecessary admission to the emergency room.

Additionally, SHARE provides Empower Health Care Solutions with 24-hour daily reports when the members are admitted and discharged from the emergency department or have an inpatient discharge. This collaboration is a continued effort to improve patient outcomes of Medicaid beneficiaries throughout Arkansas. The care coordinators are also using the VHR that displays information as a traditional clinical chart, with tabs to separate patient information into groups for easy chart review. It retrieves and shows all available data for a selected patient gathered from all participants within SHARE to enable a single, consolidated view of a patient’s health history. By also using SM the care coordinators are also able to communicate with providers and healthcare teams taking care of patients who have complex behavioral health or intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) needs.

Empower Health Care Solutions can view the following patient data through the SHARE VHR:

• Admission, Discharge and Transfer reports
• Allergies, Problems, Medications
• Demographic and Insurance information
• Laboratory results
• Radiology reports, image links
• Discharge Summaries
• Continuity of Care Documents
• Progress Notes

As the healthcare landscape continues to transform, HIEs may play a key role in providing data that fuels innovation. SHARE and Empower Health Care Solutions are working together to contribute to these innovation efforts such as population health initiatives and identifying potential social determinants of health.

About Empower Healthcare Solutions:  Empower is run by six organizations working together. Empower Healthcare Solutions, LLC (Empower) is a Provider-led Arkansas Shared Savings Entity (PASSE). This new model of care was developed to address the overall health care needs of Medicaid beneficiaries who have complex behavioral health or intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) service needs. Goals of the PASSE program are to:

• Coordinate and integrate treatment delivery across all of the individual’s providers
• Improve total health outcomes for the target population
• Increase local services capacity to help individuals with IDD access quality care and support services within their own communities
• Ensure flexibility in the individuals’ service array to address all of their health care needs
• Slow or decrease spending growth and costly acute care stays by promoting efficient and effective services

Arkansas Community Health Network (ACHN). ACHN is composed of four health care systems: Baxter Regional Health System, North Arkansas Medical System, Unity Health, and White River Health System.

Beacon Health Options (Beacon). Beacon is the nation’s largest organization exclusively dedicated to assessing and addressing the clinical and social needs of individuals experiencing mental illness, addiction and developmental disabilities. In Arkansas, since 2010, Beacon has had contracts with the Department of Human Services to assist in administering the behavioral health care delivery system.

Independent Case Management (ICM). ICM is a statewide premier provider of home and community-based supports to individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Statera. Statera is an entity comprised of leaders and innovators committed to serving the long-term support services needs of Arkansans, including those with behavioral health and developmental disability diagnoses. Together, the representatives of Statera have vast health care experience, spanning home health, hospice, skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities, independent care facilities, institutional pharmacies, retail pharmacies, medical clinics, rural health clinics, non-emergency transportation services; and full-service rehabilitation therapy businesses throughout Arkansas. 

The Arkansas Healthcare Alliance, LLC. The Alliance is comprised of approximately 22 well-established inpatient and outpatient providers, who strive to provide quality behavioral health, substance use disorder, and intellectual and developmental disability services. Together, the Alliance offers individualized treatment to tens of thousands of Arkansas infants, children, adolescents, adults, and families.

Woodruff Health Group, LLC (ARcare/pharmacist). ARcare operates as a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC). In addition, ARcare is the statewide provider of medical and case management services for the Ryan White HIV/AIDS program. Over the last 30 years, ARcare has created a health care home through a network of 36 primary care clinics, three pharmacies, and four wellness centers to serve underserved communities and provide access to quality health care.

To learn more visit: https://www.getempowerhealth.com