Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC Recertifies HIMSS Stage 7 Designation

Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh of UPMC has been successfully revalidated for Stage 7 certification on the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Analytics Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model (EMRAM).

In 2009, Children’s, a national leader in applying health information technology to improve pediatric care, was the first pediatric hospital to achieve a Stage 7 Award from HIMSS Analytics for the electronic medical record (EMR) system, which made Children’s one of the nation’s first paperless pediatric hospitals.

The EMR system, which was implemented at Children’s in 2002, electronically stores each patient’s full medical history and care details, and has significantly reduced potential medical errors and streamlined processes, making Children’s one of the most technologically advanced children’s hospitals in the nation.

The various embedded clinical decision support tools in the hospital’s electronic health record enhance safe, high-quality care. In addition, families have access to an online portal to view the health profile, test results and visit summaries; to renew prescriptions; and to request appointments.

Children’s use of state-of-the-art information technology has led to the implementation of a predictive analytic tool that forecasts clinical deterioration in patients, enabling timely interventions that may reduce the need for critical care. The hospital also developed a human milk tracking application for newborn patients in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, using barcode scanning.

“A strategic goal at Children’s Hospital is quality improvement through automation and evidence-based practice,” said Srinivasan Suresh M.D., M.B.A., chief information officer and chief medical information officer at Children’s. “We aim to build and promote the use of advanced analytic dashboards to improve safety and quality in the care of our children, which also results in measurable cost savings.”

“We have shown that collection, analysis and timely dissemination of accurate clinical data has improved patient care outcomes,” added Suresh.

“The hospital’s use of analytics to assist physicians in performance review has clearly improved their quality metrics,” said Philip Bradley, regional director, North America, health care advisory services, operations, HIMSS Analytics. “As an example, incorporating the appendicitis care dashboard in their workflow has reduced the mean length of stay for children with complicated appendicitis by 29 percent, and readmission rates for appendicitis have dropped from 6 percent to 2 percent.”

HIMSS Analytics developed the EMR Adoption Model as a tool to benchmark information technology maturity in health care organizations. Less than 5 percent of hospitals in the United States have achieved Stage 7 certification.

Children’s will be recognized for this achievement at the 2017 HIMSS Conference & Exhibition, Feb. 19 to 23, at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Fla.