Guadalupe County Hospital Selects Phoenix Health System’s Total IT Solution and Medsphere’s OpenVista

Phoenix IT outsourcing combined with Medsphere’s open-source EHR solution will help 10-bed New Mexico hospital improve patient care and safety, control costs, qualify for federal stimulus funds

Medsphere Systems Corporation, Phoenix Health Systems and Guadalupe County Hospital today announced Guadalupe’s selection of Phoenix’s Total IT Solution featuring Medsphere’s OpenVista® electronic health record. Phoenix IT expertise paired with Medsphere’s open-source EHR solution will enable this 10-bed Santa Rosa, N.M., acute-care hospital to secure federal stimulus support for health IT implementation while improving patient care.

Selection of Phoenix and Medsphere by Guadalupe and similar facilities points to a pressing need among smaller, resource-challenged hospitals for cost-effective IT solutions.

“We are deeply committed to ensuring patients receive the best possible care,” said Guadalupe CEO Christina Campos, who also serves as hospital COO, CIO and marketing chief. “This is particularly critical given our community’s limited healthcare options.

“With Phoenix Health’s IT support and our staff’s commitment to quality, we can leverage a proven open-source health IT solution to transform our paper records into an electronic recordkeeping system that will help us more cost-effectively monitor and improve patient care, and qualify for maximum federal stimulus dollars.”

Under the five-year agreement, Phoenix will provide Guadalupe with implementation and support services for OpenVista, as well as Phoenix’s Total IT Solution, a comprehensive services set that encompasses all aspects of a true 24x7 IT solution: service desk, end-user device management, infrastructure support, application management and IT leadership. Implementation and support of OpenVista will enable the hospital to meetmeaningful use requirements for stimulus funds made available through the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Under ARRA legislation, eligible hospitals that implement and meaningfully use an EHR by the 2011 deadline will receive millions of federal dollars through increased Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements between 2011 and 2014. The incentives become penalties for hospitals that have not implemented an EHR by 2015.

“Given size and funding constraints, small hospitals such as Guadalupe face challenges in terms of everyday operations, to say nothing of meeting ARRA requirements that even the bigger hospitals struggle with,” noted Phoenix President and CEO Darin K. LeGrange. “Our Total IT Solution and Medsphere’s OpenVista core clinical solution offer Guadalupe and similar facilities affordable access to a level of technological advancement previously only available to hospitals with greater resources.

“OpenVista gives us a proven, affordable and adoptable system to complement our Total IT Solution services. We are very pleased to be able to leverage this unique technology partnership to benefit rural Americans.”

Guadalupe’s OpenVista initiative marks Phoenix and Medsphere’s second collaborative venture since the two partnered to offer small rural and community hospitals an effective and affordable health IT solution. In March they announced a contract with Washington state’s Columbia Basin Hospital.

“Smaller hospitals like Guadalupe serve the underserved and play a crucial role in the fabric of rural societies,” said Medsphere President and CEO Mike Doyle. “That’s what makes this partnership with Phoenix so significant. Everyone, regardless of where they live, deserves the same quality of care and Medsphere is thrilled to engage with Phoenix to help make that a reality.”