Sunday, April 15, 2007
AUGUSTA - In less than a year, patients served by four of the state's largest health networks may see their medical records available online.
Officials at MaineInfoNet, a nonprofit corporation, are creating an electronic system they say will save money, avoid duplicate tests and procedures, save lives and improve care.
"It's typical to have two or more providers, and they're all prescribing and none of them know what the others are prescribing," said HealthInfoNet Executive Director Devore Culver.
"If you talk to pharmacists, they'll tell you it scares (them) because unless you're very faithful to their chain (in filling prescriptions), they don't know what's out there" for drugs being used by a patient, he said.
The new system would bridge that information gap.
But before it can be put into place, officials need $6 million to run a demonstration project, Culver said.
"It would be a combination of dollars coming in from the provider community, hospitals, physicians, private foundations, state government, the federal government and business," said James Harnar of HealthInfoNet, former head of the Maine Hospital Association. "It's a public-private partnership, so it's important to draw money from a number of sources."
The group already has spent about $2 million for planning and preparation to get to the point that they're ready to run the demonstration.
Most of that money came from public and private grants and foundations.
HealthInfoNet recently selected a partnership between 3M Health Information Systems from Salt Lake City, Utah, and Orion Health and Connectria, headquartered in New Zealand, to run the complex computer programs underlying the medical-records system.
Project officials have asked the Legislature to pay $2 million toward the demonstration project, with the rest expected to come from doctors, hospitals, insurance companies and other users of the system.
After testing the system for about two years with the health networks associated with MaineGeneral Medical Center, Maine Medical Center, Central Maine Medical Center and Eastern Maine Medical Center, HealthInfoNet officials expect to spend about six months reviewing and critiquing its operation.
If all has gone well, they plan to bring the system up statewide at an additional cost of $16 million.
Reader comments
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As long as DHHS is not running this system and has no say in it's development or implementation, I'm all for this. Allow those morons, with a proven track record of failure in this area, to have any say at all, and it does not have my support.
Mainers are smart enough to learn from history.report abuse
Worked well for them!!
I sure the Legislature to pay $2 million toward the demonstration project.
Spend,tax &Bond!!!!report abuse
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