INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Health Information Exchange and the not-for-profit Community Health Network announced last week that IHIE’s DOCS4DOCS service is now delivering clinical results directly into Community physician electronic health records.

IHIE and Community tested this new functionality with Community’s EHR vendor in three different practices.  IHIE says that practices will continue to be added over the coming months.

“These enhancements collect the test data, regardless of where they are performed, and put them in front of…our primary care physicians, who are responsible for keeping track of their patient’s care,” says Harry Laws, M.D., chief medical officer of Community Physicians of Indiana, part of Community Health Network. “It…makes the whole process more effective.”

The DOCS4DOCS service replaces traditional delivery systems such as courier and postal mail.  The service was developed by the Regenstrief Institute and is run in conjunction with IHIE.

IHIE is a non-profit corporation formed by the Regenstrief Institute, private hospitals, local and state health departments, BioCrossroads and other Indiana organizations. Community Health Network is an integrated healthcare network with more than 70 sites of care throughout central Indiana.

In addition to the EHR vendor used within the Community system, IHIE has been testing interoperability with ten other EHR vendors, and is in discussions to test with others.  IHIE anticipates rolling out this functionality to other hospital systems in Indiana.

“While Community has been electronically transferring patient results directly into the physician EHR system for years, this IHIE service provides for results from other hospitals to be delivered directly into the physician’s electronic inbox and eliminates the paper copy in the office,” said Ed Koschka, chief information officer of Community Health Network.  “This translates into improved patient care by reducing the time it takes to interpret patient results and taking the appropriate action.”
 
The DOCS4DOCS service is currently used in 25 hospitals in Indiana, which send about one million messages each month to approximately 5,000 Indiana physicians at 1,900 practices. IHIE provides the service to major hospital systems such as Clarian Health, Sisters of St. Francis Health Services, Inc., St. Vincent Health and Wishard Health Services.