Three hospitals to integrate HIS on Meditech solution

MARKHAM and NEWMARKET, Ont. – The CEOs of Markham Stouffville Hospital (MSH), Southlake Regional Health Centre (Southlake), and Stevenson Memorial Hospital (Stevenson), are excited to announce a new partnership to integrate their Health Information System (HIS) and accelerate the adoption of electronic health records.

Over the next year, Southlake and Stevenson will update their HIS to the latest version of Meditech’s system, a solution already in use at MSH.

“I am inspired to see this partnership unfold, and am pleased to work with two excellent organizations like Southlake and Markham Stouffville Hospital on a critical project to deliver safe, quality care,” said Jody Levac (pictured), president & CEO, Stevenson Memorial Hospital. “This groundbreaking partnership allows smaller hospitals the opportunity to bring optimal technology to daily operations, and ultimately improve patient experience.”

Meditech systems are in use at over 50 percent of Ontario hospitals. Updating health information systems through this partnership will create an electronic foundation that will enable Southlake and Stevenson to more rapidly move to a fully electronic health record, joining MSH, a top ranked HIMSS EMRAM community hospital in Canada.

“We are excited to work with Southlake and Stevenson on this collaborative partnership,” said Jo-anne Marr, president & CEO, Markham Stouffville Hospital. “We believe that by working together we can maximize our resources and invest in systems and technologies that will benefit our patients. This new partnership builds on Markham Stouffville Hospital’s expertise with Meditech and we are excited to leverage this knowledge to the mutual benefit of all three organizations.”

The partnership positions all three organizations to more readily adopt technologies that improve patient care and safety, as well as enhance patients’ experience while in hospital. It marks the first integration of its kind under the province’s eHealth 2.0 guidelines, released in the summer of 2016.

Taking a ‘one patient, one record’ approach, this integration will enable seamless access to patients’ health information at all three sites.

The integrated system will allow clinicians to access more information about their patients when they need it from almost anywhere. This will be particularly beneficial to patients who are cared for at multiple sites, such as cardiac and cancer patients, who receive care at both their local hospital and at one of Southlake’s regional programs.

“This partnership puts patients first in that it improves quality and provides seamless access to health records between the three hospitals,” said Dr. Dave Williams, president & CEO, Southlake Regional Health Centre. “As a regional centre, Southlake provides care to patients from across York Region and Simcoe County and there are tremendous benefits and efficiencies that integrated technology will provide.”