WOONSOCKET, R.I. — MinuteClinic, the retail health clinic subsidiary of CVS Caremark Corp., plans to switch its current proprietary electronic medical record (EMR) system to the AllscriptsMyWay Electronic Health Record (EHR).
The company said Tuesday that the transition to the Allscripts platform will make it part of one of the largest networks of health care providers using EHRs, furthering its mission to deliver high-quality, accessible medical care through its 600-plus clinics inside CVS/pharmacy stores in 25 states.
"MinuteClinic is partnering with Allscripts to assure that we are utilizing the most advanced electronic health record platform in the market," MinuteClinic president Andrew Sussman, who’s also senior vice president/associate chief medical officer at CVS Caremark, said in a statement. "This will help support our nurse practitioners and physician assistants in continuing to meet and exceed the high standards we have set for quality and adherence to practice guidelines."
MinuteClinic noted that Allscripts’ current clients include some of the health care systems with which it has affiliated, putting MinuteClinic in a better position for future growth and clinical collaboration.
"As part of an expanding partnership, we’re dedicated to helping MinuteClinic continue its high patient satisfaction rating by enabling seamless, private and reliable access to patient information where and when it’s needed and also provide the opportunity to share their treatments electronically with the patient’s primary care physician," stated Glen Tullman, chief executive officer of Allscripts.
Also on Tuesday, a coalition led by EHR vendors, PDR Network, professional liability carriers and providers, in tandem with the Food and Drug Administration, launched an initiative to improve drug safety and medication adherence by integrating drug services for prescribers and their patients into EHR platforms and other health information technology.
The initiative was unveiled in a media event at the Health Information Management and Systems Society (HIMSS) annual conference in Las Vegas, which featured speakers from the FDA, Allscripts, drug labeling and safety provider PDF Network and professional liability carrier The Doctors Company.
During the press event, PDR and its partners announced the launch of PDR BRIEF, a new service that delivers FDA-approved labeling and drug alerts within EHRs and electronic prescribing systems. PDR also noted that the vision of adverse drug event reporting integrated into EHRs and health IT was advanced with the announcement of a national rollout of an adverse drug event reporting system operated by PDR, RxEvent, into CVS Caremark’s more than 7,000 pharmacies.
