Rhode Island Hospital Enhances Infection Control With TheraDoc’s Clinical Decision-Support Software

SALT LAKE CITY, UT, 03/03/2005 -- TheraDoc®, Inc., a medical informatics company, is implementing its expert clinical decision-support software at Rhode Island Hospital in Providence, an academic medical center that serves as a teaching hospital for Brown Medical School. TheraDoc’s software was selected for its ability to automate surveillance of discreet patient data, streamline data collection, and bring critical information to the clinician’s attention. The software will help the hospital’s infection control team to make better-informed, timely decisions, in an effort to reduce patients’ risk of hospital-acquired infection.

“The field of infectious diseases is complex; software such as TheraDoc’s can expedite the daily work of the infection control team so that they can have a bigger impact on saving patients’ lives,” said Leonard. A. Mermel, D.O., Sc.M., A.M. (Hon), Rhode Island Hospital’s medical director, department of infection control. “When clinicians harness the software’s power to collect patient data, they will dramatically reduce the grind of data collection and make better use of their time.”

Julie Jefferson, R.N., M.P.H., C.I.C., Rhode Island Hospital’s director of epidemiology and infection control, stated further, “Infection control professionals (ICPs) easily spend between two to four hours daily manually gathering the data they need. TheraDoc’s automated processes allow ICPs more opportunity to serve, teach and heal.”

According to Dr. Mermel, who was recently named president of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology (SHEA), hospitals and ICPs daily contend with gathering vital and diverse patient information from a hospital’s myriad departments in time to prevent infections in a vulnerable patient population. TheraDoc’s expert clinical decision-support software offers the possibility of addressing such issues by bringing infection rates and their relative antibiotic resistance levels to the attention of a hospital’s clinicians and infection control team -- in real-time and at the point-of-care.

Stanley Pestotnik, TheraDoc’s founder, president and CEO, said, “Our software will increase productivity as well as significantly reduce patient harm and associated costs by delivering the information clinicians need to better manage infectious disease occurrences, intervene quicker and prescribe more appropriately. We look forward to supporting Rhode Island Hospital’s objective of advancing medicine and changing lives.”

TheraDoc is installing its expert system platform (ESP) and several products from its suite of clinical decision-support software at Rhode Island Hospital, including Antibiotic Assistant, Infection Control Assistant and Clinical Alerts Assistant. Through integration with the hospital’s disparate information systems, TheraDoc’s software will automate surveillance and streamline data collection as well as analyze, interpret and transform clinical data into meaningful, actionable information. The company’s intelligent alerting system provides timelier notification of infectious disease occurrences and delivers critical patient information along with therapeutic recommendations supported by evidence-based medical knowledge -- within the clinician’s daily workflow.

About Rhode Island Hospital

Founded in 1863, Rhode Island Hospital is a private, not-for-profit hospital and is the largest teaching hospital of Brown Medical School. A major trauma center for southeastern New England, the hospital is dedicated to being on the cutting edge of medicine and research. Rhode Island Hospital ranks 13th among the independent hospitals that receive funding from the National Institutes of Health, with research awards of more than $27 million annually. Many of its physicians are recognized as leaders in their respective fields of oncology, cardiology, orthopedics and minimally invasive surgery. The hospital’s pediatric wing, Hasbro Children’s Hospital, has pioneered numerous procedures and is at the forefront of fetal surgery, orthopedics and pediatric neurosurgery.

About TheraDoc, Inc.

TheraDoc is a medical informatics company specializing in therapeutic, real-time decision support that improves the quality, safety, and efficiency of patient care in large and small healthcare organizations. Integrated with disparate hospital information systems or electronic medical records, TheraDoc’s technology helps clinicians manage multiple processes of care across multiple conditions and diseases.

Founded in 1999, TheraDoc designs, develops, and supports a suite of clinical decision support technologies. TheraDoc’s founders and core medical informatics team are internationally recognized for their pioneering work in medical expert systems. Their experience in clinical decision support design and development spans two decades. On the Net: TheraDoc’s site: www.theradoc.com

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