FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Chicago (July 14, 2003) — Sisters of Mercy Health System has been named one of the nation’s MOST WIRED according to the 2003 Most Wired Survey and Benchmarking Study, released today by Hospitals & Health Networks magazine.

“Hospitals are empowering patients with information and providing tools to doctors and nurses to improve quality,” says Alden Solovy, executive editor of Hospitals & Health Networks, the journal of the American Hospital Association, which has named the 100 Most Wired hospitals and health systems annually for five years.

The 100 Most Wired are providing Web-based patient education at the bedside, disease-specific self-assessments online and are linking clinical equipment to feed patient readings directly into the medical record. “Patient care is at the heart of these initiatives,” Solovy says. “The nation’s 100 Most Wired hospitals are emphasizing clinical quality and patient services in their efforts to remain technology leaders.”

The survey was conducted by Hospitals & Health Networks, in cooperation with McKesson Corporation and the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS). It measures the nation’s hospitals on their use of Internet technologies for safety and quality, customer service, disaster readiness, business processes and workforce issues.

“Hospitals are investing in IT to help them achieve their strategic objectives, especially in the areas of quality, safety and efficiency,” says Barry P. Chaiken, M.D., vice president, medical affairs, for the Information Solutions division of McKesson. “There’s a strong and growing recognition of the value that comes from having the right information at the point of care. That value takes the form of greater care team efficiency, less variability and fewer errors, and ultimately improved health outcomes.”

Analysis from this year’s survey results shows:

The nation’s Most Wired hospitals have made a significant commitment to exploring how Internet technologies can improve patient education at the bedside.

12% of the Most Wired have hospital-wide Internet-enabled bedside patient education programs.
An additional 42% of the Most Wired have pilot programs.

Most Wired hospitals are using Web-based technologies to feed readings from clinical equipment directly into the medical record.

• 70% of Most Wired organizations push readings from cardiac function monitors to medical records.
• 71% of Most Wired organizations push blood glucose monitor readings to medical records.

Most Wired hospitals continue their drive to make customer services available via the Internet.

• 42% provide preregistration.
• 87% provide physician referrals.
• 53% provide appointment scheduling.

Most Wired hospitals are deploying electronic disease surveillance systems.

• 55% have partially electronic methods of disease surveillance.
• 26% have fully electronic methods of disease surveillance.

Results from the survey were used to name the 100 Most Wired, the 25 Most Improved, the 25 Most Wireless and the 25 Most Wired—Small and Rural. More than 400 health systems responded to the survey, representing 1,128 hospitals or 19 percent of U.S. hospitals.

The 100 Most Wired are the organizations that scored highest on the survey. The 25 Most Wireless are those that scored highest on the survey questions specific to wireless applications. The 25 Most Improved are organizations not appearing on the 100 Most Wired list whose score improved the most from 2002 to 2003. The 25 Most Wired—Small and Rural are small and rural organizations not appearing on the 100 Most Wired list that scored highest on the survey. Ties in the Most Wireless and Most Wired—Small and Rural categories resulted in longer lists.

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About Mercy
The Sisters of Mercy Health System, based in St. Louis, Missouri, operates hospitals, physician practices, outpatient clinics, health plans, and related health and human services in a seven-state area including Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas. Its members include 19 acute care hospitals providing nearly 4,500 licensed beds, a heart hospital, a psychiatric hospital, a managed care subsidiary (Mercy Health Plans), physician practices, outpatient care facilities, home health programs, skilled nursing services and long-term care facilities. Services are provided by approximately 28,000 co-workers and 4,000 physicians who are employed or practice at Mercy facilities.

About Hospitals & Health Networks
Hospitals & Health Networks, the journal of the American Hospital Association, conducts the Most Wired survey annually. McKesson Information Solutions is a division of McKesson Corporation, the leading provider of supply, information and care management products and services designed to reduce costs and improve quality across health care. The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society provides leadership for the management of technology, information and change.