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Siemens Medical Solutions to Demonstrate Patient Health Card Technology at HIMSS


WEBWIRE

Siemens Medical Solutions will demonstrate its Patient Health Card - a portable, secure smart card used to store patient demographic data and critical healthcare information - in booth #7453 at the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) 2007 Annual Conference and Exhibition.

The Patient Health Card will strengthen Siemens Medical’s leadership in advancing the adoption of a universal electronic health record - helping healthcare providers optimize clinical and administrative workflow through immediate access to timely patient information, and providing patients with secure, portable access to their medical records.






The technology is contained on a chip-embedded, photo identification card, approximately the size of a credit card. When admitted to a healthcare facility, a patient inserts the card into a reader and enters a private, personal identification number to unlock the card, providing the facility with access to the patient’s information such as chronic diseases, allergies, current medications, lab results, medical histories, and demographic data including insurance information - thus limiting clinical and financial risks due to lack of information.






“Poor access to information is one of the leading causes of medical errors, claim denials, and lost revenue. According to the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine, as many as 98,000 people die each year due to preventable medical errors,” explained Volker Wetekam, vice president of global solutions at Siemens Medical Solutions.






“Even if medical errors do not occur, registration errors that result in insurance claim denials can cost healthcare facilities millions of dollars a year, which then get passed onto consumers through higher individual contributions, co-pays, etc. Easy access to current patient information is vital to quality of care, efficiency, and cost-effectiveness. The Siemens Patient Health Card allows patients to be tracked through a complete course of treatment, even across organizations. This technology, combined with Siemens workflow-engineered healthcare information technology solutions, enables us to develop integrated solutions that help improve healthcare quality of care while reducing costs.”






Currently, the Siemens Patient Health Card is being tested at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. HIMSS attendees had the opportunity to hear details about the status of this pilot program at an educational session featuring Paul Contino, vice president of information technology at Mount Sinai Medical Center titled, “Siemens Smart Card Solutions for Improved Care” at the HIMSS Privacy and Security Product Pavilion.



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