NIH Clinical Center awarded prestigious certification for electronic medical record system

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The Clinical Center at the National Institutes of Health is the first federal medical facility to be recognized by a leading healthcare organization for eliminating the use of paper charts and maintaining a superior electronic medical record system for inpatient care. Health Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) Analytics

awarded the research hospital Stage 7 certification, the highest level attainable, within their electronic medical record adoption model.

The NIH Clinical Center joins a premiere group of 2,200 hospitals out of 32,000 in the HIMSS Analytics database that have reached Stage 7 certification for inpatient care.

While the NIH Clinical Center has been using electronic medical records as far back as the 1970s, it has earned this high level certification for:

removing the use of paper charts in delivering and managing inpatient care
using an electronic system for reporting scientific findings and analyzing patterns of clinical data to improve quality of inpatient care, patient safety and care delivery efficiency
sharing clinical information, including document and medical images, via standardized electronic transactions with entities that are authorized to treat patients

The Clinical Center’s Clinical Research Information System (CRIS) was evaluated by HIMSS Analytics. CRIS is the primary computer information system used to support patient care, research and administrative activities in the research hospital. The system is used by over 2,750 people daily including physicians, nurses and ancillary and administrative staff. NIH experts rely on CRIS to manage patient protocol information, write medical orders, retrieve laboratory results, document progress notes and other aspects of medical care.

HIMSS Analytics, which is a wholly owned, not-for-profit subsidiary of HIMSS, delivers data and analytical expertise and provides an Electronic Medical Record Adoption Model to analyze which stage an organization has achieved. The certification level, known as Stage 7, is based on a 0 to 7 scale measuring the extent to which an organization has adopted the use of electronic medical records to care for patients and improve their health outcomes.

About the NIH Clinical Center: The NIH Clinical Center is the clinical research hospital for the National Institutes of Health. Through clinical research, clinician-investigators translate laboratory discoveries into better treatments, therapies and interventions to improve the nation's health. More information: http://clinicalcenter.nih.gov.

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.

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