ETON, UK – NHS Fife, which provides healthcare to the 370,000 residents of Fife, has become the latest health board in Scotland to adopt a new patient information system from Cambridge, Mass.-based InterSystems.

InterSystems will deploy its TrakCare electronic medical record and clinical information system.

TrakCare enables health boards in Scotland to share essential information securely across organizations and geographical boundaries.

Serving a mixed urban and rural area, NHS Fife provides hospital-based and community care for the United Kingdom’s 370,000 residents, managing more than 420,000 outpatient visits and 98,000 emergency patients episodes every year.

The implementation of TrakCare will allow clinical staff from across the organization to securely access, manage and update a patient’s essential health information using a single master patient index.

[See also: Australian health system Bendigo Health taps InterSystems for electronic health record.]

The consolidation of health information into a single record will also support staff in their clinical decision-making,. The goal is for providers to be better informed and be better prepared  to improve patient safety and outcomes.

This opportunity to further improve the quality of care it provides is at the heart of the organisation’s decision to adopt TrakCare explains William Edwards, NHS Fife’s General Manager for eHealth:

“TrakCare is being adopted by NHS Fife as part of our programme to converge with other NHS Boards, and we will be able to benefit from the experience of other boards as we progress towards the delivery of electronic patient records.,” William Edwards, NHS Fife’s General Manager for eHealth, said in a statement. “In time it will also allow us to adopt common processes and work to standards agreed across Scotland.”

[See also:  Saudi Arabia hospital achieves HIMSS Analytics Stage 7 EMRAM .]

NHS Fife will be the 12th Scottish Health Board to adopt InterSystems TrakCare with around 92 percent of the population of Scotland soon to be covered by the programme.

“The basis of high-quality care is ensuring that essential patient information is accessible to all who need it, when they need it,” Mark Palmer, country manager, UK, InterSystems, said.“Our objective is to help NHS Fife achieve its goal of delivering the highest quality of patient care.

“We have designed the system to put clinicians in control, and patients at the centre. As a result of NHS Fife’s decision, even more people in Scotland will benefit from the seamless and secure exchange of information provided by TrakCare,” he added.