Member physicians of South Jersey Healthcare, an integrated healthcare system offering hospital, ambulatory care and home healthcare services, will soon be offered electronic health records.

SJH will provide physicians on its medical staff with a financial subsidy to acquire and implement an EHR from Tampa Fla.-based Sage Software through its eHealth Connection grant program.

eHealth Connection offers physicians an annual three-year benefit. Through the program, SJH subsidizes 85 percent of the EHR licensing fee for physicians on its medical staff. For a single physician practice, this amounts to approximately $2,300 over three years toward EHR licensing fees and an additional $1,600 distributed annually to maintain licenses.

"We've made a substantial investment in our hospital systems, implementing a clinical information system as well as hospital information systems. The hospital electronic medical records project is slated to begin later this year," said Tom Pacek, chief information officer for SJH. "Our boards and administration feel strongly that to fully realize the efficiencies of these systems, our community-based physicians must adopt appropriate systems, too. Through our eHealth Connection, we will subsidize the cost of the electronic health records system and interfaces to our hospital clinical information system and HIE."

"Our goal is to develop a health information exchange, or HIE, in our region, using interaction between our hospitals, other facilities and community physicians as the catalyst," said Pacek.

SJH will cover the cost to implement software interfaces, allowing physicians to connect directly with SJH and receive registration information, lab and radiology results, lab results and transcribed inpatient reports.

"Since the relaxation of Stark regulations, more hospital systems are offering electronic health records to their community-based physicians," said Sharon L. Howard, senior vice president of sales and marketing for Sage. "These visionaries, like SJH, are moving our country's healthcare agenda forward toward a more quality-focused, evidence-based system of care."