Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh Cuts Medication Errors in Half and Eases Regulatory Compliance with CPOE

[Cerner via BizWire]

KANSAS CITY, Mo. & PITTSBURGH--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 30, 2004--As
a perennial top hospital, Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh has a long
history of delivering high-quality healthcare. Today, Children's
continues to lead the way in pediatric care by using healthcare IT
solutions from Cerner Corp. (Nasdaq:CERN) to cut medication errors in
half, decrease medication delivery times and expedite regulatory
compliance.
"The elimination of error, delay and variance that Children's has
achieved is a result of its steadfast, strategic vision of how
healthcare should be delivered," said Trace Devanny, Cerner president.
"By embracing healthcare IT, Children's continues to benefit families
by streamlining care and providing better access to information that
is crucial in the care process."
Considering that KLAS, a leading research firm, recently validated
that only 2.7 percent(a) of U.S. hospitals actively use some form of a
computerized physician order entry (CPOE) system today, Children's
demonstrated it was well ahead of the curve when it launched
Children'sNet, an electronic health record and CPOE system, in October
2002. In the 16 months since the implementation, Children's has
utilized Children'sNet to:

-- Cut medication errors that cause harm in half and virtually
eliminate weight-related adverse drug events by electronically
requiring appropriate weights before a medication order can be
placed.

-- Eradicate transcription/handwriting errors and ensure
necessary order information is 100 percent complete the first
time.

-- Reduce medication delivery times by 50 percent.

All physicians who practice at Children's have met the CPOE system
training requirements, resulting in approximately 1,100 physicians
using CPOE. "The effectiveness of our CPOE can be attributed to our
own physicians and clinicians working with Cerner to create order sets
and ordering 'alerts' for Children'sNet," said Jocelyn Benes, vice
president of quality and care management at Children's. Children's now
has 610 order sets that not only aid the ordering clinician's recall
but also help standardize ordering, communication and best practices
throughout the institution.
Another benefit of CPOE at Children's was the ability to gain
control of several compliance issues. For example, Pennsylvania
regulations require that any order be co-signed within 24 hours. With
CPOE, timed alerts now remind physicians to sign any orders that
require co-signature. As a result, sign-off rates initially rose from
75 percent and then reached 97 percent. They continue to be in the
high nineties 16 months later. In 2003, Children's received
accreditation with full standards compliance from the Joint Commission
on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO), which is a
direct benefit of implementing CPOE, according to Benes.
These combined results have Children's on track toward their goal
of a fully electronic health record by 2007, and are a strong example
of how Cerner's CPOE implementations with partners such as Children's
continue to lead the healthcare IT market. According to the 2003
Dorenfest Complete IHDS+ Database(TM), Cerner has the largest market
share for CPOE systems when including both live and contracted acute
care hospitals. Of the hospitals in the process of implementing CPOE,
21 percent stated they were using or contracted to use Cerner's CPOE
solution.

About Children's

Children's is the only hospital in western Pennsylvania dedicated
solely to the care of infants, children and young adults. U.S. News &
World Report consistently ranks the 235-bed hospital as one of the 10
best in the nation. Last year, it ranked eighth in funding provided by
the National Institutes of Health. Children's has 2,200 employees and
740 active staff physicians.

Cerner Corp. is taking the paper chart out of healthcare,
eliminating error, variance and waste in the care process. With more
than 1,500 clients worldwide, Cerner is the leading supplier of
healthcare information technology. The following are trademarks of
Cerner: Cerner, Cerner's logo. Nasdaq: CERN, www.cerner.com.

(a) The 2004 KLAS Enterprises CPOE Digest is available at
www.healthcomputing.com.