LAS VEGAS, Sept. 18, 1997 — It wasn’t the sound of slot machines spewing coins that had representatives of nine health-care solution developers grinning today at the Las Vegas Hilton Hotel and Casino. It was news that they had won the Microsoft® Industry Solution Awards (ISAs) for Health Care.
The awards were presented by John D. Carpenter, Microsoft Corp. worldwide health-care industry manager, and David Greenburg, chairman of the Microsoft Healthcare Users Group (MS-HUG), during a special ceremony at the third annual MS-HUG Windows® on Healthcare Conference, which concludes today.
The nine winners were selected from approximately 75 entries, 24 of which made it into the final rounds. The ISAs are designed by Microsoft and MS-HUG to recognize the health-care solution developers that best use Microsoft technology, specifically the Windows NT® Server network operating system and the Microsoft BackOffice® family of products, to provide tangible business benefits to health-care organizations. Participants were tested on a range of measurable business-benefit scenarios and asked to demonstrate that their customer application offers the best features and functionality.
“We’ve seen a groundswell of solution developer participation in this ISA program, a lot of strong competition in each category,” said Mark McDougall, executive director of MS-HUG. “Overall, attendance in this Windows on Healthcare conference is growing by leaps and bounds each year as well. I think that reflects how popular Microsoft-based products are becoming in the health-care industry.”
Carpenter agreed with McDougall, citing the continuing increase in the number of health-care solution developers utilizing Microsoft technology.
“In just two years, we have gone from about 40 health-care solution developers to more than 400 today,” Carpenter said. “The growth curve doesn’t show any sign of slowing, because developers have fully learned the benefits of using Microsoft technology.”
Health Care ISA Winners by Category
Following are the winners in the nine ISA categories specific to health care:
Acute Care (Administrative/Financial Systems)
Lanier Worldwide Inc. of Atlanta, Ga., with its DOCument Imaging/DRG product, version 1.2. For more information, contact Julie Coburn at (770) 621-1211 or at [email protected] .
Acute Care (Clinical/Patient Information Systems)
Health+Cast Inc. of Huntingdon Valley, Pa., with its HInet Clinical Link for the Internet product, version 2.1. For more information, contact William A. O’Donnell at (888) 464-4638 or at [email protected] .
Ambulatory Care (Administrative/Financial Systems)
Millbrook Corp. of Dallas, with its Millbrook Paradigm product, version 2.0. For more information, contact Robert J. Holbrook at (972) 663-2010 or at [email protected] .
Ambulatory Care (Clinical/Patient Information Systems)
John Deere Health Care Inc. of Naperville, Ill., with its Electronic Medical Records System. For more information, contact Michael Wang at (630) 637-3200 or at [email protected] .
Managed Care (Administrative/Financial Systems)
Health Systems Technologies Inc. of Seattle, with its product, The Trillium Managed Care System. For more information, contact Laura Bridenback at (206) 448-7004, ext. 294, or at [email protected] .
Managed Care (Clinical/Patient Information Systems)
Sequoia Software Corp. of Columbia, Md., with its Medstar product, version 1.5. For more information, contact Jeff Mason at (410) 715-0206, ext. 226, or at [email protected] .
Other (Administrative/Financial Systems)
Pro Business Systems Inc. of Pensacola, Fla., with its Healthware product, version 5. For more information, contact Walter J. Voytek II at (904) 479-9035 or at [email protected] .
Other (Clinical/Patient Information Systems)
Knorr Associates of Butler, N.J., with its DataPipe product, version 2.6. For more information, contact Norman R. Dotti at (201) 492-8500 or at [email protected] .
Customers’ Choice Award
Avio Corp. of Maitland, Fla., with its Avio Billing Manager product, version 2.0. For more information, contact John Cooper at (407) 667-4280 or at [email protected] .
ISA Category Descriptions
Types of Health-Care Systems
Administrative/Financial Systems includes appointment scheduling; patient admissions, discharges or transfers; patient registration; staffing or scheduling; medical staff credentials; practice management or patient billing; insurance claims processing; accounts receivable or accounts payable; costing; contract management; and materials management.
Clinical/Patient Information Systems includes physician support, nursing support, patient care information systems, results reporting, access to medical research data and shared information between hospitals and physicians. Other examples of Clinical/Patient Information Systems are medical records or charts, care plans, transcription, patient histories, Web sites for posting medical images and voice notes, Internet consultations between physicians, record security, online preoperative evaluation through post-operative recovery and ICU.
Areas of Specialty
Acute Care includes hospitals and other health-care organizations that provide acute care or critical care.
Ambulatory Care includes group practices, individual practitioners and clinics.
Managed Care includes payor systems, insurance companies and health maintenance organizations.
Other includes home health care, long-term care, dental and other miscellaneous health-care organizations.
Customers’ Choice Award is a special award given to the solution provider whose work was judged the best overall by the conference attendees.
Award Winners Selection Committee
Three finalists in each of eight categories were selected by a preliminary judging panel of industry executives. These finalists then demonstrated their solutions at the MS-HUG conference, Sept. 15-18. The winners in eight categories were chosen after the judges viewed their solutions on-site. Conference attendees determined the ninth winner, the Customers’ Choice Award.
The final judging panel included Charles M. Alexander, M.D, director of outcome research with Merck & Co.; Joseph Amaroso, chief information officer at University Physicians Inc.; Clark Bell, editor and associate publisher of Modern Healthcare Technology; Larry F. Blevins, senior vice president of information technology at Harris Methodist Health Inc.; Joseph Cappuccio, director of medical informatics at Rochester General Hospital; Richard Mendola, Ph.D., chief information officer for the University of Illinois Medical Center; Charles E. Potter, director of medical informatics at Strang Cancer Prevention Center; David Premo, group publisher for Intertec Publishing; Benjamin Rooks, health-care information analyst at Vector Securities International; and Chris Rust, senior analyst programmer for Aukland Healthcare Services.
Headquartered in Ann Arbor, Mich., the independent, nonprofit Microsoft Healthcare Users Group is the leading health-care industry forum for exchanging ideas, promoting learning, and sharing solutions for information systems using Microsoft technologies. MS-HUG works to provide industry leadership, drive appropriate standards and develop associated requirements in support of health-care solutions. The diverse membership of MS-HUG is unified by a shared interest in implementing vendor- and user-developed software based on Microsoft technology to improve quality and efficiency in health care.
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