Physician practice IT

Clinicare installs IT solution at Fraser Health site

CALGARY – CLINICARE Corp., a leader in Chronic Disease Management (CDM) tools and integrated drug database applications, announced that its Electronic Medical Records (EMR) and Practice Management Applications (PMA) have been selected by Fraser Health to provide better service and better health outcomes for clients of the Agassiz Community Health Centre located in Agassiz, B.C.

“Our goal is to better manage and improve the health of people in our community by bringing healthcare services together,” said Maureen Wood, Fraser Health’s health services administrator for Hope and Agassiz. “This community’s team of healthcare providers will use CLINICARE’s EMR to share accurate information and consult collaboratively on care plans for their patients.”

CLINICARE’s software will reside on an IBM pSeries server located at a Fraser Health facility and be accessed remotely by Agassiz’s physicians and medical staff through a secure Virtual Private Network (VPN) connection.

This Application Service Provider(ASP) configuration will allow the family physicians to participate more actively in primary healthcare reform while relying on the health authority for management of the IT system.

“Across Canada, there is a drive to use primary care centres and electronic medical records to provide more seamless, more patient-centred care. People living in Agassiz and Harrison will benefit from our team adopting the most modern tools and models of care for our clients,” said Dr. Sean Larsen, lead physician at the Health Centre.

“Keeping pace with advancements in technology and medicine also helps us recruit and retain healthcare professionals to our area,” he said. “In our opinion, CLINICARE’s solution was the only one we researched that could help us realize the goals of the Agassiz Community HealthCentre.”

The Agassiz group became convinced of the benefits of the CLINICARE solution when they visited a true working ‘chartless’ site running CLINICARE software over a wireless network in neighbouring Chilliwack.

“We have pioneered the integration of unique features like Chronic Disease Management (CDM) tools and First DataBank’s (FDB) drug database into our EMR application. FDB automatically provides notification of drug to drug, drug to allergy interactions and drug dosage checking and will allow these physicians to be more productive and improve patient outcomes,” said Dennis Niebergal, president and CEO of CLINICARE.

“We are pleased that the health authority has selected CLINICARE as their healthcare information technology partner for the Agassiz Community Health Centre,” said Niebergal.

About CLINICARE
CLINICARE Corporation (www.clinicare.com) has specialized in software development for the ambulatory physician market since 1984. CLINICARE has received the ‘Best in KLAS’ Award two years in a row for being North America’s highest rated Ambulatory EMR for groups of 6-25physicians. CLINICARE received these Awards because of its software functionality that enables the delivery of high quality healthcare with enhanced patient safety while allowing physicians to practice medicine their own way. CLINICARE has branch offices in the United States and Canada, with its head office in Calgary, Alberta.

About Fraser Health
Fraser Health (www.fraserhealth.ca) is the largest and fastest-growing health authority in British Columbia, serving 1.4 million residents or one-third of the province’s population with a budget of $1.7 billion. Fraser Health provides health services across the continuum of care (hospital, community, public, addictions, primary care and mental health) for 20 municipalities and two electoral areas from Burnaby to White Rock to Hope. IT solutions for the Agassiz Community Health Centre are separate from, and do not represent a commitment for, other sites being developed within Fraser Health’s primary care renewal plans.