Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Allscripts (NASDAQ: MDRX) and its clients have taken significant actions to ensure effective care delivery in the communities they serve. With unwavering dedication to patient health, caregivers from both large hospital systems and independent physician practices around the world continue to excel in the face of the unprecedented crisis to help manage their patients and combat the spread of the virus.
New York State's largest health system and longtime Allscripts partner, Northwell Health, was at the epicenter of the outbreak in its initial stages. The system is powered by more than 72,000 clinicians and administrators, and many of its facilities use the Sunrise electronic health record to treat patients and analyze data to identify trends to help improve patient outcomes amidst the pandemic.
"COVID-19 is impacting patients in ways we have never seen before, and it's critical we study the vast amount of data we’ve collected to continue to refine our treatment plans," said Northwell Health Senior Vice President and Deputy Physician-in-Chief Thomas McGinn, MD, MPH. "With Allscripts as our trusted partner and its solutions in our arsenal, we’re tackling the spread of the disease and learning how to better manage this crisis."
Working closely with its clients,, Allscripts has helped healthcare organizations rapidly implement telehealth capabilities to enable virtual patient visits at many organizations. Throughout the COVID-19 experience, more than 100 Allscripts clients have selected FollowMyHealth Telehealth, which creates engagement of patients in their homes and fosters increased communication between them and their healthcare providers.
Hackley Community Care Center - located in Muskegon Heights, Michigan - recently and very quickly enabled virtual patient visits using Allscripts Professional EHR Mobile and FollowMyHealth. The accomplishment meant its more than 50 caregivers in 14 locations seeing 300–350 patients a day could meet the COVID-19 pandemic head on while still serving all of its patients.
Megan Byrne, Hackley Assistant Operations Manager, said, "We had been using FollowMyHealth for five years, so when the pandemic hit, we already had the first step rolling for our patients. It was a good experience for them because it wasn’t something new. In an uncomfortable time for patients unable to see providers in person, the fact that they already had the technology on their phones, laptops and tablets made a huge difference in continuity of care."
As the United Kingdom's Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust began preparing for the coronavirus outbreak, it decided to accelerate the deployment of the dbMotion Solution.
"Allscripts collaborated with the Trust to deploy the critical solution in only a matter of weeks, quickly helping position us to have access to the information we need to effectively meet the very high demand for acute patient care," said Adam Thomas, Dudley Group's Chief Information Officer.
In March in Australia, SA Health completed its Sunrise implementation at Royal Adelaide Hospital, the state's flagship hospital. The health system implemented several innovations to ensure that all COVID-19 cases were prioritized and effectively managed, leveraging Sunrise's full capabilities to successfully manage the influx of COVID-19 patients.
SA Health Chief Digital Health Officer Bret Morris said, "Sunrise EHR has been an important instrument in managing COVID-19 and the ability to adapt the solution at pace has enabled us to be nimble and powered excellent case traceability of patients as they moved through our system."
Using the CarePort Health care coordination platform, hospitals in Michigan were enabled to proactively communicate COVID-19 testing status to post-acute providers, both pre- and post-discharge. As a result, post-acute providers could take necessary measures to protect staff and patients, as well as manage the use of personal protective equipment. CarePort also enabled hospitals to more easily identify post-acute providers accepting COVID-19 positive patients, minimizing time spent by discharge planners and case managers calling individual facilities to determine their capabilities and capacity. This was especially critical as hospitals across the state reached or exceeded capacity during the COVID-19 surge.
In addition, Veradigm, an Allscripts subsidiary focused on the payer and life sciences market, co-founded the COVID-19 Research Database, a repository of HIPAA-compliant, de-identified and limited patient-level data sets that are intended to be made available to public health and policy researchers pro-bono, enabling them to extract insights to help combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Veradigm also implemented new clinical workflows into its electronic health record to enable physicians to better identify patients at risk for the disease.
"By leveraging existing solutions and implementing new, innovative tools specifically designed to address the novel coronavirus, caregivers will continue to be positioned to meet the evolving challenges of the pandemic head on, as the healthcare industry navigates a volatile present and moves toward an uncertain future," said Allscripts Chief Executive Officer Paul Black. "We're proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with our clients as they continue to fight, every day, to ensure the health of their patients throughout this challenging time."
About Allscripts Allscripts (NASDAQ: MDRX) is a leader in healthcare information technology solutions that advance clinical, financial and operational results. Our innovative solutions connect people, places and data across an Open, Connected Community of Health™. Connectivity empowers caregivers and consumers to make better decisions, delivering better care for healthier populations.