Presbyterian Healthcare Services, a not-for-profit system of hospitals in New Mexico, is planning to revamp its patient call center by improving access to patient data.

PHS plans to introduce the Presbyterian Customer Service Center by late 2010. The center will be supported by Chicago based Initiate Systems, Inc.'s Initiate Patient, a master data management platform.

PHS has deployed Initiate Patient to integrate patient and member information to obtain a single, comprehensive view of its customers in real-time. Officials said this will provide call center agents with detailed information about their callers to help streamline call routing and improve customer service.

"In support of our enterprise-wide customer service center initiative, we selected Initiate Patient to provide the unified view of patient data at the point of registration and to improve our understanding of patients as member-customers," said Donna Agnew, CIO of Presbyterian Healthcare Services.

"However, as the call center initiative gets underway, we are learning more about the product, and we realize that it can address other health information exchange needs in our organization now. We are also using it to link all the disparate data sources within the hospital and in our health insurance systems," Agnew said. 

PHS plans to leverage Initiate Patient to  manage data exchange for the more than half a million members enrolled in its health plan.

"Accurately identifying and understanding patient and customer data is one of the most important requirements of healthcare systems," said Lorraine Fernandes, vice president and healthcare industry ambassador for Initiate Systems. "By selecting Initiate Patient, PHS can ensure it is able to access valuable and critical patient, member or customer data whenever and wherever it is required. In addition, our technology provides the flexibility to address Presbyterian's evolving needs."