Siemens Convenes Leading Customer CPOE Users for Fourth Annual Symposium Promoting Patient Safety

Last year the Institute of Medicine (IOM) issued a startling report, stating that 1.5 million Americans are injured or killed every year due to medication errors, costing at least $3.5 billion per year nationwide in hospital costs. These errors include administration of the wrong medication, overdoses, and overlooked drug interactions and allergies. They occur for many reasons, including illegible handwritten prescriptions and decimal point errors, and often have tragic consequences for patients.






Today, Siemens convenes approximately 175 leading users of Siemens Computerized Physician Order Entry (CPOE) for its fourth annual CPOE symposium. The event is intended to promote patient safety and enable best practices sharing among leading healthcare facilities and CPOE users, including physician leaders, nurse clinicians and informaticists, pharmacists and CIOs. The 2-day educational symposium features interactive discussions facilitated by expert physician and nurse CPOE users from institutions such as Holy Redeemer Health System (Huntingdon Valley, Pa.), Lifespan (R.I.), Alegent Health (Omaha,Neb.) and The Chester County Hospital (West Chester, Pa.).






“Emerging technology holds great promise for enhancing the delivery of healthcare,” notes Siemens CPOE symposium keynote speaker and industry expert Michael R. Cohen, RPh, MS, ScD, Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) (Huntingdon Valley, Pa.). “Prescription writing is perhaps the most important paper transaction remaining in our increasingly digital society, and electronic prescribing tools can minimize medication errors related to handwriting.”






CPOE systems, such as Siemens Medical Solutions CPOE, which today is used by more than 18,000 physicians, are electronic prescribing systems that help intercept errors when they most commonly occur--at the time medications are ordered. Siemens CPOE clinician users typically place 75 to 100 percent of patient care orders, including medication orders, electronically.






“At many levels, CPOE is enhancing patient care at Holy Redeemer,” said Siemens CPOE symposium speaker and CPOE clinician user, Jonathan Sternlieb, MD, FACG, chief medical information officer, Holy Redeemer Health System. “We are finding that communication among the care team is better coordinated and doctors’ orders are acted upon more quickly. CPOE is an important component of Holy Redeemer’s strategy to reduce errors, enhance patient safety and improve the quality of care.”






With Siemens CPOE, clinicians can quickly access the information they need including, vital signs, test results, care plans, decision support and best practice order sets and rules. Once orders are entered, they are automatically sent to the appropriate (customer-defined) recipients--nursing, pharmacy, radiology, and other clinical departments. The results and outcomes of every order are recorded to a growing repository of clinical data that can be accessed to analyze outcomes and improve best practices and care delivery.






“CPOE is key to achieving healthcare providers’ electronic health record strategies, while improving clinical workflow and helping to advance quality and patient safety initiatives,” said Janet Dillione, president, Health Services, the Healthcare IT Division of Siemens Medical Solutions. “Siemens annual symposium provides a forum for customers at various stages of CPOE adoption to have an open dialogue on best practices and offer solutions to the challenges of CPOE implementation so that as industry leaders we can work together to reduce the costly--and even deadly--technological gulf in healthcare.”






About Siemens Medical Solutions






Siemens Medical Solutions of Siemens AG (NYSE:SI) is one of the world’s largest suppliers to the healthcare industry. The company is known for bringing together innovative medical technologies, healthcare information systems, management consulting, and support services, to help customers achieve tangible, sustainable, clinical and financial outcomes. Recent acquisitions in the area of in-vitro diagnostics - such as Diagnostic Products Corporation and Bayer Diagnostics - mark a significant milestone for Siemens as it becomes the first full service diagnostics company. Employing more than 41,000 people worldwide and operating in over 130 countries, Siemens Medical Solutions reported sales of 8.23 billion EUR, orders of 9.33 billion EUR and group profit of 1.06 billion EUR for fiscal 2006 (Sept. 30).Further information can be found by visiting www.usa.siemens.com/medical-pressroom.