National HIMSS Davies Awards Recognize EHR Value, Improved Care

National HIMSS Davies Awards Recognize EHR Value, Improved Care
The HIMSS Davies Awards of Excellence recognize excellence in the implementation of and value from health information technology

CHICAGO (September 15, 2010) – Since 1994, the HIMSS Davies Awards of Excellence have recognized management, functionality, technology and value - the pillars of health IT success. The six winners of the 2010 HIMSS Davies Awards deliver quality care to the patients and populations they serve through the use of information technology – specifically the electronic health record. As healthcare leaders, these 2010 winners of the HIMSS Davies Awards of Excellence appear below in the four award categories: organizational, ambulatory, community health organization and public health.


HIMSS Organizational Davies Award
Sentara Healthcare – Norfolk, Va.
Sentara Healthcare, a not-for-profit, integrated health care system in southeastern Virginia and northeastern North Carolina, includes 8 hospitals, health plans with 415,000 covered lives, and a 400 physician medical group. With approximately 95,000 inpatient admissions per year and 4.2 million outpatient visits per year, Sentara’s eCare EHR system provides a single-view access for results retrieval across all environments of care. Sentara Healthcare’s highly sophisticated dashboard includes both business and clinical metrics, providing business intelligence that allows for proactive patient care and management of its operations.

Nemours – Wilmington, Del.
Nemours provides primary and multispecialty ambulatory and inpatient pediatric care, across 34 locations in four states, employing 4,000 associates and 430 physicians, with its flagship hospital, Nemours/Alfred I duPont Hospital for Children (AIDHC), located in Wilmington, Del. The value of its EHR, NemoursOne, “one patient, one record,” EHR has been infused throughout its enterprise, driven by its well articulated balanced scorecard methodology. NemoursOne, in combination with its data warehouse, has developed a streamlined medication reconciliation process, a challenge nationwide, with an outpatient system-wide rate currently at 88 percent.

“The Davies Organizational Award recognizes excellence in the methods for implementation and the value derived from the use of an EHR. The Davies program objectives include promoting the use of EHRs, understanding the value of EHRs and raising visibility of EHRs through sharing successful implementations,” says Tom Smith, Chair HIMSS Organizational Davies Award Committee. Smith is also Chief Information Officer, NorthShore University HealthSystem in Evanston, Ill, a 2004 Davies Award winner. “In addition, to helping other organizations by documenting best practices, organizations that apply for Davies Awards have a powerful tool for recognizing the effort that the staff of their organization expends to implement and support an EHR.”

HIMSS Ambulatory Davies Award

The Diabetes Center – Ocean Springs, Miss.
The Diabetes Center, PLLC is a nurse practitioner-owned private practice focused on the treatment on management of patients with diabetes from ages 13 and older. The practice opened on Nov. 1, 2005, as a direct result of Hurricane Katrina, to provide access to care for patients suffering from diabetes who were unable to travel elsewhere. It serves a patient population of a 75-mile radius on the Mississippi Gulf Coast with approximately 125,000 lives in the suburban area. The Diabetes Center actively monitors over 400 diabetes pumps, digitally downloaded at check-in to become a part of the patient record, leading to optimal treatment and care.

Miramont Family Medicine – Ft. Collins, Colo.
Recognized in 2009 by NCQA as a Level III Patient Centered Medical Home, this six- physician, six mid-level providers, four clinic location practice embraces the multi-disciplinary team care approach to care, offering a myriad of ancillary services, including three certified laboratories, on-site digital x-ray, prescription dispensing, laser aesthetics, bone densitometry, open access scheduling, on-site physical therapy, mental health, and other visiting specialists. Patient processing times were measured before and after EHR implementation, with the percent of “value added time” improving from 64.2 percent to 67.5 percent, resulting in more efficient time spent during the patient/provider visit.

“Decades before our nation's health system reached this critical impasse, many visionaries foresaw the need to bring the practice of medicine into the computer age. Although other awards and certifications recognize how well healthcare organizations are doing in comparison to their peers, the Davies Award, has always recognized, and continues to recognize, them against the possibilities of the future,” says Daniel Griffin, MD, who is Chair, HIMSS Davies Ambulatory Committee, and 2006 Davies Award winner. “As this nation struggles with cost and quality issues relative to healthcare, there is a growing appreciation that - through the use of information technology- we can hope to monitor, understand and improve our health system.”

Community Health Davies Award: Open Door Family Medical Center, Ossining, NY
Open Door Family Medical Center, Inc., a federally qualified community health center, serves the under-served, uninsured and underinsured residents of Westchester County, New York. Over 92 percent of Open Door’s patients have incomes at or below the 200 percent of the federal poverty line and more than 55 percent have no health insurance of any kind. As a Joint Commission accredited health center and an NCQA Level III Patient Centered Medical Home, Open Door leverages its data warehouse and quality reporting tools to achieve care quality and operational efficiency. Open Door embraces knowledge sharing and collaboration with numerous partners to improve healthcare system efficiencies and benefits.

“The Davies Award is the highest recognition of excellence that a community health organization can receive for its EHR implementation and use, and this year's winner, Open Door Family Medical Center, is a deserving recipient of the Davies. The medical center staff has shown leadership, vision and enthusiasm in its EHR implementation; they and their community are reaping the benefits of improved patient outcomes and operational efficiencies. Each member of their staff, clinical and executive teams has been a part of this, and each deserves recognition for great work and commitment to a future of continuing improvement. They offer a model for CHOs across the country,” says Margaret F. Schulte, DBA, FACHE, CPHIMS, Instructor, Masters of Science in Medical Informatics, Northwestern University, Evanston, Ill.

Public Health Davies Award
Wisconsin Division of Public Health’s Wisconsin Immunization Registry (WIR) – Madison, Wis.
In 2000, the Wisconsin Immunization Registry was developed to consolidate the immunization records of the citizens of Wisconsin in a central database and to share this information with health care providers, schools, other health related programs and families for the purpose of improving the immunization status of its citizens and to prevent the occurrence of vaccine preventable diseases. Currently more than 11,000 users from 1,609 provider organizations operating at some 4,200 facility sites are on the WIR. More than 2,500 schools have "look-up" access to the WIR. There are more than 6.8 million client records with 49 million associated immunization records. Each working day, 18,000 new or historical vaccine administration records are added to the WIR. In addition, 1,000 users are accessing the WIR at any given time throughout the day. Public access accounts for some 17,800 accesses monthly for a total of 213,654 accesses in 2009.

"The Wisconsin Immunization Registry has demonstrated excellence in their system development, population health impact, and their open source philosophy. A key population health population benefit of WIR is the ability for parents to look up their child's web-based vaccination lifelong record, bridging a typical immunization record gap. Sixteen states are now using WIR's modules and as a result are well-positioned to exchange immunization registry data with hospitals and eligible providers as part of the Meaningful Use Menu Option," said Amy Ising, chair, HIMSS Davies Public Health Steering Committee, and NC DETECT Program Director, Chapel Hill, NC, a 2005 HIMSS Public Health Davies Award winner."All of us on the committee congratulate the WIR for their dedication and commitment to public health and receipt of the HIMSS Davies Public Health Award."

More about the Davies Award:
Since 1994, the HIMSS Davies Award of Excellence program has honored 70 healthcare organizations that have implemented health IT, specifically EHRs, in their respective locations. These include:

Organizational Davies Award
Initiated in 1994, 29 healthcare organizations recognized
Ambulatory Care Davies Award
Initiated in 2003, 20 practices recognized
Public Health Davies Award
Initiated in 2004, 14 public health entities recognized
Community Health Organization Award
Initiated in 2008, 7 community health organizations recognized
Visit the HIMSS Web site for more information on the Davies Award of Excellence program. Davies Award winners will share their success stories of EHR implementation at the 2011 HIMSS Annual Conference & Exhibition during the Day of Excellence on Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2011, in Orlando, Fla. Visit the education page of the HIMSS11 Web site for more information.

About HIMSS Davies Award of Excellence
The HIMSS Nicholas E. Davies Award of Excellence recognizes excellence in the implementation and use of health information technology, specifically electronic health records (EHRs), for healthcare organizations, private practices, public health systems, and community health organizations. Created by CPRI-HOST in 1994, the first three recipients of the Davies Organizational Award were recognized in 1995. In 2002, CPRI-HOST merged with the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS), and now, HIMSS manages the award program. The Award honors Dr. Nicholas E. Davies, an Atlanta-based practicing physician, president-elect of the American College of Physicians, and a member of the Institute of Medicine Committee on Improving the Patient Record, who died in 1991 in a plane crash. Visit www.himss.org/davies for more information, including educational resources.