News release: National

February 4, 2003

For more information, call:
Beverly Hayon
Kaiser Permanente
Phone: (510) 271-6437
E-mail: Beverly.Hayon@kp.org

Berna Diehl
Phone: (202) 326-1726

Marriage between nation's largest health care group and most advanced technology to revolutionize health care

Unprecedented transition to automated medical records will take patient care and administration to new level

Washington, DC – The nation's largest integrated health delivery organization, Kaiser Permanente, today announced it will revolutionize patient care delivery through its partnership with the most advanced health care technology available. Using a next-generation system from Epic Systems Corporation (Madison, Wis.), Kaiser Permanente will positively transform the patient experience for its 8.4 million members by taking health care quality, safety, and service to a new level.

"People are starting to realize how automated medical systems enhance the quality of patient care, but until now, no one has implemented them so thoroughly on such a large scale," said George Halvorson, chairman and CEO of Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and Kaiser Foundation Hospitals, Inc. "Creating secure 24/7 access to up-to-date patient records will mean improved patient care—whether patients visit their personal physician or any provider in our medical groups across the country."

With automation, Kaiser Permanente will eliminate the inefficiencies and error proneness of paper-based systems. Patients, physicians, and other authorized health care staff will have immediate access to complete, up-to-the-minute medical records, including test results, regardless of time or location. Immediate access to the best current medical science will help streamline patient care processes and improve health outcomes. Through the new system, patients also will be able to schedule appointments, request medication refills, and ask for referrals. The system also furthers the ongoing partnership between patients and physicians by making health care and health maintenance an integrated process.

"The use of information technology to improve the quality and efficiency of health care services is a major priority for HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson," said Carolyn Clancy, MD, acting director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. "This new initiative is a wonderful example of how the power of information technology can be harnessed to make the kind of achievable improvements in health care quality that the American people want and deserve."

According to Judith Faulkner, CEO and founder, Epic Systems Corporation, "Kaiser Permanente's vision offers significant advantages for providers and patients alike, especially in sharing information across locations and over time. Our systems provide instant information access at every point of care in a secure, protected environment, which encourages collaborative activity among health care providers and patients."

Kaiser Permanente members constitute the nation's largest population enrolled in systems of care, and collectively, through the organization's extensive patient database, can provide a rich source of protected, anonymous clinical information. Large-scale research using this extensive data will further the entire medical community's understanding of health on a population or epidemiological level, while providing critical data for developing best practices.

"We support medical research that can help doctors gain greater understanding of the diseases we face and document the best ways to treat them," said Francis J. Crosson, MD, executive director of The Permanente Federation, the national governing organization for the regional Permanente Medical Groups, which is the physician component of Kaiser Permanente. "At the same time, we are committed to protecting our patients' privacy and fully complying with government privacy provisions. That is why we selected a system with state-of-the-art security, with many levels of password protection."

Kaiser Permanente plans to implement the system in phases, with full system functionality available to all patients and physicians nationally within the next three years.

"This is great news. The health system generally is woefully behind in the digital revolution. Kaiser Permanente has set a new standard for which everyone should be grateful," said Helen Darling, the president of the Washington Business Group on Health. "This kind of innovation means better allocation of time and resources, more effective and efficient delivery of evidence-based practice, better patient care, more accountability and a more user-friendly system."

About Kaiser Permanente
Kaiser Permanente (Oakland, Calif.) is America's leading integrated health care organization. Founded in 1945, it is a non-profit, group-practice prepayment program. Kaiser Permanente serves the health care needs of 8.4 million members in nine states and the District of Columbia. Nationwide, Kaiser Permanente includes approximately 90,000 technical, administrative and clerical employees and about 11,000 physicians representing all specialties.

About Epic Systems Corporation
Epic Systems Corporation (Madison, Wis.) develops integrated inpatient, ambulatory, and payor systems. Epic provides the information backbone for many of the largest, most progressive health care organizations in the country, linking thousands of concurrent users with a shared source of relevant clinical, access, and revenue-cycle information. Epic applications incorporate the safety net of embedded clinical and financial decision support at relevant points in the care continuum.