Microsoft Health Users Group (Microsoft HUG) and Microsoft Corp. have announced the winners of the 12th annual Microsoft HUG 2009 Innovation Awards, which recognizes organizations, vendors and systems integrators that demonstrate advancements and success using Microsoft technology in the healthcare industry.
Microsoft HUG, a healthcare industry forum for exchanging ideas, promoting learning and sharing solutions for information systems using Microsoft technologies, has more than 5,000 members and more than 25 corporate supporters.
Each year, Microsoft HUG and Microsoft collaborate to produce the Microsoft HUG Innovation Awards, which evaluates contestants on the extent to which they provide significant business benefits to healthcare organizations and improve patient care.
The following are the 2009 winners for the Microsoft HUG Innovation Awards:
Winner for Best Use of Clinical Records -- Inpatient
* Heritage Valley Health System, a community-based healthcare system located in southwestern Pennsylvania was recognized with Healthcare Software Collaborative LLC for developing a Mobile Clinical Access Portal (M-CAP). M-CAP is a completely mobile clinical portal providing seamless collaboration with clinical desktop applications and real-time, anywhere access to more than three years' worth of cross-continuum clinical information.
Winner for Best Use of Clinical Records -- Ambulatory
* Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare, a healthcare system based in Elmhurst, Ill., with Horsham, Penn.-based NextGen Healthcare Information Systems Inc .was recognized for implementing NextGen EHR. NextGen EHR allows providers to securely access comprehensive and up-to-date charts from any location, ensuring that current patient data is available to enable informed decision-making and additional time to see more patients each day.
Winner for Best Use of Information Exchange (HIE) and Interoperability
* Northeast Physician Hospital Organization (NEPHO), a physician organization affiliated with Beverly and Addison Gilbert hospitals of Massachusetts, was recognized with Waltham, Mass.-based MedVentive Inc. for developing MedVentive Quality Intervention Module (QIM), a collaborative care platform that resulted in quality above the 90th percentile nationally across diabetic care, adult and pediatric preventive care, women's health, and cardiovascular disease, while being efficient with utilization and cost of care.
Winner for Best Use of Microsoft HealthVault Applications
• American Heart Association Inc. based in Dallas, was recognized with Rockville, Md,-based Get Real Consulting for launching Heart360, an online health management tool that sets personal goals for blood pressure, cholesterol and weight, and tracks other heart disease risk factors. All this data is then stored online in the patient's HealthVault account.
"With the recent discussions in Washington, leveraging health IT to improve patient outcomes, control costs and enable informed decision-making has never been more important," said Chris Sullivan, industry solutions director, Microsoft U.S. Health and Life Sciences Group. "The Microsoft HUG 2009 Innovation Awards winners represent true health IT leadership and serve as an example to all healthcare providers seeking guidance on how to best take advantage of their IT investments in a difficult economic time. Microsoft will continue to work with the organizations honored today, as well as with people throughout the world to discover new and innovative ways that technology can address key challenges facing consumers and providers."
