Press Release: Unibased Announces Newest Software Release ForSite2020® Version 7.09

Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. (Unibased) announced the release of its newest solution, ForSite2020® version 7.09, aimed at improving workflow and productivity as well as enhancing communication and strengthening ties with patients and physicians. Providing expeditious client support, unrivaled responsiveness, and an ongoing commitment to the most advanced technology available, Unibased offers several major new-feature enhancement releases per year to its clients. ForSite2020® version 7.09 will provide healthcare organizations with an enhanced workflow, increased operational efficiency, and improved physician relations as well as an improved patient experience with streamlined coordination of care.

Unibased’s ForSite2020® version 7.09 includes significant enhancements that will have a substantial impact on healthcare organizations. New innovative features such as a streamlined “pending orders” list for inpatient and outpatient physician orders, providing comprehensive data collection and order detail including pending reasons as well as call history with the number of call attempts to the patient and physician with time/date-stamped comments. This new display provides an at-a-glance summary of all outstanding orders on one line per patient, offering a drill-down collection of more detailed information on the order, patient, and procedure(s) for improved workflow and enhanced accuracy to prevent lost orders and coordinate the scheduling of those orders in the most efficient and expeditious way possible.

Other new and exciting enhancements include an automatic launch of the patient payment estimation upon scheduling of the patient service for more enhanced workflow automation and data capture. Also new is the complete audit trail for all comments in order to keep a history of all additions, edits, and removals of comments including registration comments, session comments, procedure comments, and master person index (MPI) comments.

New features have also been added to Unibased’s ForSite2020® Consumer Access & Scheduling for Healthcare (CASH) patient portal. The ForSite2020® CASH reminder notices now allow for facility-customized reminders for both patient requests and patient schedules to provide improved patient satisfaction and decreased “no-show” occurrences, leading to increased market share and an enhanced bottom line.

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Attn: Vision 2012 Annual Users Conference Attendees

Award-Winning Surgery Management & Access Management/ Enterprise Scheduling Solutions for MedSeries4 Customers

If you are attending the Vision 2012 Annual Users Conference in Salt Lake City, Utah, April 22-25, we invite you to visit Unibased at BOOTH 24. 

Win an HDTV!  We're giving away a fabulous HD television. To enter, simply visit BOOTH #24 and fill out an entry form!

Our tailored and customized system features and guaranteed interfaces and conversions to Siemens MedSeries4 customers make Unibased the first choice of MedSeries4 hospitals looking for an information systems partner for resource management and enterprise scheduling as well as surgery management.

• Unibased is the #1 Rated Enterprise Scheduling & Surgery Management Systems Vendor
• Workflow Integration with MedSeries4 Applications
• Guaranteed Sub-Second Response Times
• Meaningful Use Certified
• ForSite Analytics Dashboard Reporting
• Mature and Comprehensive Web Tools for Physicians and Consumer Access
• Automated Faxed Physician Order Handling Module
• FIXED Implementation Costs
• Stable System Requiring Minimal IT Support

Unibased has been providing our 200 customers with healthcare solutions for over 26 years.  Our systems have been successfully interfaced to Siemens MedSeries4 in a number of client sites, including: Bay Area Hospital (Coos Bay, OR), Monongalia General Hospital (Morgantown, WV), Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children (Dallas, TX) & Brattleboro Memorial Hospital (Brattleboro, VT). 

Vision 2012 User Conference Contact:

George M. Giorgianni

Senior Director of Surgical System Sales and Business Development

Office Phone: 314-878-6050, ext. 163

Mobile: 404-915-6439

Email: ggiorgianni@unibased.com

Press Release: Brattleboro Memorial Hospital Selects Enterprise Scheduling and Surgery Management Solution from Unibased Systems Architecture

Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. (Unibased) announced today that Brattleboro Memorial Hospital (BMH), in Brattleboro, VT, has signed an agreement to deploy its award-winning ForSite2020® solution suite, including ForSite2020® Resource Management System (RMS), ForSite2020® periOperative Resource Management System (ORMS) and ForSite Analytics business intelligence tool.  After an extensive evaluation process, BMH selected Unibased as the best solution available to provide the physician and patient community with an enhanced consumer experience, facilitating access management, enterprise scheduling, surgery management and business intelligence analytics across the BMH enterprise for improved resource utilization and streamlined coordination of care.

The integrated solution suite will provide coordinated scheduling for all patient services and departments including surgery and streamline the scheduling of pre-surgical diagnostic procedures to ensure they have been completed prior to the day of surgery, as well as efficiently coordinate follow-up care and post-discharge activities to eliminate costly readmissions.  Unibased’s comprehensive ForSite2020® solution insures revenue growth by efficient utilization of resources to reduce costs and increase operational efficiencies.  ForSite2020® will also play a key role in the implementation of an integrated electronic health record (EHR), seamlessly connecting the surrounding physician practice electronic medical records (EMRs) to the hospital’s lab and radiology services, utilizing the State of Vermont’s health information exchange (HIE), which is based on the Medicity platform.  The HIE and other methods of communication with the community will improve quality of care, patient safety and healthcare efficiency.  Unibased’s ForSite2020® solution will facilitate these objectives as well as improve the coordination of patient care, and the integration with the HIE will provide a platform for participating physicians to confirm patient schedules based upon requested services in an expeditious fashion, strengthening hospital physician alignment and consumer loyalty.

 

Jon Farina, BMH Chief Information Officer, stated, “Unibased is the right partner for a hospital like ours.  They are committed and focused on providing not only a comprehensive, integrated and easy-to-use system; but also very focused on service and support.  They provided us with a cost-effective solution which combined both surgery management and enterprise scheduling into one integrated system, enabling BMH to provide our customers – patients and physicians – the highest level of service.  They also had a great track record at several other Siemens MedSeries4® customers, which meant a lot to us.  They truly care, and they take care of their customers.”   Deb Berdan, BMH Director of Perioperative Services, added, "Unibased will provide us with all of the elements required for an efficient O.R. management system.  We will have a user-friendly O.R. documentation system that will allow us to charge by exception from our electronic preference cards as well as have easy access to a large number of reports for process improvement.  Having 24/7 tech support is also an added benefit."

About Brattleboro Memorial Hospital:  Brattleboro Memorial Hospital is a modern, well-equipped and professionally staffed community hospital which has been serving greater Brattleboro and the tri-state area since 1904.  Throughout more than a century of caring for the community, BMH has kept up with medical technology which, in turn, has drawn excellent physicians to its facility.  The BMH Medical Staff boasts more than 100 board-certified physicians, active in both primary care and many specialties.  For more information, please visit www.bmhvt.org.

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Press Release: Unibased Systems Architecture Achieves "Best in KLAS" for 9 Consecutive Years

According to the annual year-end "Best in KLAS Awards: Software & Services" report published on December 15, 2011 by KLAS Enterprises, LLC., Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc (Unibased) received the "Best in KLAS"¹ Award for the market segment of Enterprise Scheduling for the 9th consecutive year, reflecting outstanding product quality, system reliability and support, and unmatched client satisfaction. Unibased, within the KLAS evaluation metric of “Full Disclosure” meaning that consultants had access to all Unibased clients for interview purposes, had the highest Product Quality Rating of 8.5 out of 9.0, far outweighing any of its competitors. The runner-up, Epic Cadence, had a quality score of 8.1. 100% of Unibased clients indicated that they would buy again as compared to the runner-up, only 97%. Besides Epic Cadence, the other competitors were: Cerner Scheduling Management, McKesson Pathways Healthcare Scheduling, QuadraMed Enterprise Scheduling and SCI Solutions Schedule Maximizer. Siemens Soarian Scheduling did not have enough evaluations to be ranked, and StatSchedules StatScheduler was not ranked because it is a regional solution.

The "Best in KLAS"¹ Awards report also singled out 16 vendors as having excelled in their respective market segments, some vendors having multiple segments. Of the vendors and products recognized, Unibased had the highest product score of 92.2 for its ForSite2020® Resource Management System (RMS).

Larry Covington, Unibased President & CEO, expressed gratefulness to Unibased's clients for their kindness and loyalty. Covington added, "This is no time to rest on our laurels. We recognize that improvements must be made and we are working on that in several areas. We will continue to provide 3 major product feature upgrade releases annually. Our markets of access management and surgery systems are demanding products and services that improve our clients’ quality and coordination of care, consumer relations and competitiveness, productivity and bottom line. Our product in the KLAS market segment of Enterprise Scheduling imbeds an integrated surgery management system, physician and consumer portals, a multi-facility EMPI, registration and admission, inpatient census, order management, analytics, fax management, security and privacy, resource management and utilization reporting, physician order tracking, and of course, enterprise scheduling. We were the first vendor in our market segment to be certified for Meaningful Use, and all new releases will be certified as well. The most significant component within our array of modules associated with ForSite2020® RMS is a massive library of interfacing and file conversion software, providing optimal interoperability and the ability to easily work and integrate with other vendors. This is one of the reasons we can respond quickly to the unique needs of our clients, and a critical component for Accountable Care Organizations."

“Since 1998, KLAS has been committed to helping healthcare providers make decisions based on candid peer feedback,” says Adam Gale, KLAS president. “Best in KLAS rankings mark those vendors who best keep their promises in their market segments for offering a combination of superior products, strong service and high customer value. We hope these ratings continue to help providers find transparency from their vendors in making purchasing decisions.”

¹ 2003 - 2011 Best in KLAS Awards: Software & Services, December 2011. © 2011 KLAS Enterprises, LLC. All rights reserved. www.KLASresearch.com

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Press Release: Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian Signs Agreement for Unibased ForSite2020® RMS Enterprise Scheduling

Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. (Unibased) announced today that Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian (Hoag) has signed an agreement for the license and implementation of the Unibased ForSite2020® Resource Management System (RMS) software application suite, including the POCET and CASH physician and consumer portals. Hoag intends to use ForSite2020® to provide the physician and patient community with an enhanced customer experience that will include a streamlined registration process, 24/7 availability to self-service functions, and a one-call “one-stop-shop” scheduling process for all services and procedures across the Hoag enterprise and five of its institutes, which include Hoag Cancer Institute, Hoag Heart and Vascular Institute, Hoag Neurosciences Institute, Hoag Women’s Health Institute, and orthopedic services through Hoag’s affiliate Hoag Orthopedic Institute.

ForSite2020® will play a role in both the Hoag implementation of an electronic health record (EHR) and a health information exchange (HIE), linking physician practices, clinics, reference labs, imaging centers, pharmacies, diagnostic centers and patients. The HIE and other methods of communication with the community will improve quality of care, patient safety and healthcare efficiency. The Unibased ForSite2020® RMS enterprise scheduling system will facilitate these objectives as well as improve the coordination of patient care. The HIE will provide a platform for participating physicians to confirm patient schedules based upon requested services in an expeditious fashion.

Tim Moore, Hoag’s Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer, stated, “Hoag exists solely to provide the best healthcare experience possible to the communities we serve. Hoag has a long-term commitment in investing in our communities through enabling technologies. After an extensive evaluation process, we have selected Unibased as our comprehensive enterprise scheduling solution related to their proven track record, ease to work with, and commitment to our shared objectives.”

Phil Amelung, Principal Consultant for Unibased, agreed, “Unibased is looking forward to supplying Hoag with tools they will use to transform the way services are accessed and delivered at Hoag. With a project like this, everybody wins. Patients and physicians are provided more convenient access and a consistent “front door” to services at Hoag, administrative processes are streamlined so that service locations can focus on providing quality services for their patients, and many business service benefits are realized from enhanced and expedited revenue cycle functions.”

About Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian:  Hoag is a not-for-profit regional healthcare delivery network in Orange County, CA that treats nearly 30,000 inpatients and 350,000 outpatients annually. Hoag consists of two acute-care hospitals, seven health centers and three urgent care centers (with three more scheduled to open in Fall 2011). Hoag Hospital Newport Beach, which has served Orange County since 1952, and Hoag Hospital Irvine, which opened in 2010, are designated Magnet hospitals by the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC). Hoag offers a comprehensive blend of health care services that include six institutes providing specialized services in the following areas: cancer, heart and vascular, neurosciences, women’s health , primary care and orthopedics through Hoag’s affiliate Hoag Orthopedic Institute. Hoag has been named one of the Best Regional Hospitals in the U.S. News & World Report Metro Edition. National Research Corporation has endorsed Hoag as Orange County’s most preferred hospital for the past 15 consecutive years and for an unprecedented 15 years, residents of Orange County have chosen Hoag as the county’s best hospital in a local newspaper survey. Visit http://www.hoag.org/.

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Press Release: Unibased Receives “Best in KLAS” Recognition for the Market Segments Enterprise Scheduling and Surgery Management for Eight Consecutive Years

Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. (Unibased) has achieved the “Best in KLAS” Awards for both the Enterprise Scheduling and Surgery Management market segments for the year 2010, reflecting outstanding product quality, system reliability and client satisfaction. With its focus on revolutionizing access to care and enhancing the patient experience, Unibased strives to improve the coordination, quality and efficiency of healthcare services for patients, physicians and providers. Achieving “Best in KLAS” as published in the annual year-end “Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards” report for the last eight consecutive years exemplifies Unibased’s deep commitment to its clients and unparalleled service and support.

“Since 1998, the objective of the ‘Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards’ report has been to help healthcare providers make informed decisions,” said KLAS President Adam Gale. The Best in KLAS distinction represents a commitment to meeting customer expectations and we congratulate the vendors making strides in every phase of customer relations—from the sales presentation to implementation to ongoing service and support.”

Unibased Systems Architecture's Resource Management System (RMS) ranked #1 in the Enterprise Scheduling category as well as its periOperative Resource Management System (ORMS) ranked #1 in the Surgery Management category in the 2010 “Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards: Software & Professional Services” report. Both solutions have been the top ranked system in their respective market segments for the last eight consecutive years (2003-2010).1

Larry Covington, Unibased’s President and CEO, stated, “Healthcare providers are facing the perfect storm of increased demand, reduced reimbursement from third party payers, increases in self-pay and consumer’s portion of the bill, and a 9.5% unemployment rate. Resource productivity and better utilization of resources, including both fixed and variable costs, is critical to provider survival. For 24 years, Unibased has focused on provider efficiency, which includes software products that are lights out in availability and reliability, and easy to use and support. Our reference is our entire client list, no exceptions. We ask our clients that if we are not their best vendor, please tell us why and we will make adjustments. We are proud of our eight consecutive years as first in our market segments, and we expect to be highly competitive in 2011.”

According to the 2010 “Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards” report, KLAS evaluates 200+ vendors, 750 products, within 4,500 hospitals annually. As indicated in the annual “Best in KLAS Awards” report, for the market segments of Enterprise Scheduling and Surgery Management, Unibased competes with GE, McKesson, Cerner, Epic, Siemens, Meditech, QuadraMed and other smaller vendors as listed by KLAS.1

About Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc.: Celebrating its 24th year in the healthcare information technology (HIT) industry, and having achieved “Best In KLAS”1 for 8 consecutive years (2003-2010) in the market segments of surgery management and enterprise scheduling, Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. (Unibased), an Amerinet supplier, markets various products that are open, scalable, integrated client/server and web-based solutions, designed to meet the unique needs of healthcare organizations and improve the coordination of healthcare services. In the HIT industry, Unibased offers ForSite2020® as an integrated solution that provides improved access management processes including scheduling, EMPI and registration, and tracking patient resource needs from pre-access through follow-up. ForSite2020 monitors the effectiveness of clinical programs, financial productivity and capacity management to improve quality, safety and efficiency of healthcare delivery.

ForSite2020 has an integrated surgery management module which coordinates surgery procedures and surgeon scheduling, pre-admission activity monitoring, surgeon preferences, suite utilization, materials management, clinical worker training and certification, perioperative charting, and surgery-based EHR. ForSite2020 improves the communication between hospitals and physicians through its physician portal, automated order creation, and business intelligence analytics. ForSite2020 impacts the revenue cycle through functions such as validation of patient demographics, patient’s current insurance eligibility checking, assurance of medical necessity compliance and estimation of the patient’s out-of-pocket expense based upon scheduled and ordered services.

Unibased solutions will increase provider sales quickly, through its physician and consumer portals as well as its call center management capabilities. They will reduce provider debt associated with patient payments and minimize claim denials associated with inaccuracies and missing documentation. Most importantly, providers realize these benefits within months, not years. All Unibased solutions are supported by integrated automatic data collection processes such as bar coding, facsimile collection and retention, optical and intelligent character recognition, and document image collection and storage – all linked to the appropriate patient and administrative records. Unibased Systems Architecture, Inc. is a private corporation founded in 1986 and is based in Chesterfield, Missouri. All Unibased products are made and supported in the United States.

1) 2003 - 2010 Top 20 Best in KLAS Awards: Software & Professional Services, December 2010. © 2010 KLAS Enterprises, LLC. All rights reserved. www.KLASresearch.com

BAPTIST ST. ANTHONY HEALTH SYSTEM (BSA), Impact Study – Patient Satisfaction

Introduction

According to a recent survey (August 2010) performed by HealthLeaders Media Intelligence Unit of more than 200,000 healthcare executives 93% of the healthcare leaders say patient experience is among their top priorities". Baptist St Anthony Health System (BSA) is a health system which considers patient satisfaction to be a critical measure of their success.

It so happens that a key area identified via the patient feedback was related to wait times. Bottom Line – long wait time equates to decreased patient satisfaction. With the implementation of Unibased ForSite2020 Surgery Management System BSA considered this an opportunity for them to understand the impact the scheduling system could have on patient satisfaction.

BSA took this goal to heart, and began designing a better patient experience around it, from the time the Patient entered the workflow, through to the completion of care.

Overview of what took place

Scheduling
Through the usage of block tracking in the ForSite2020 Surgery Management system, BSA gained previously unrealized visibility to utilization and helped streamline block assignments. As a result the staff was able to target under utilized areas for reassignment. In addition, BSA was able to identify areas of need which included the best times for assigning blocks based on specific surgeon and service procedure volume. Although BSA has not yet been able to quantify the increase in surgeon satisfaction the general belief is that it has increased.

Pre-Admission Testing
BSA began scheduling their patient activity within the ForSite2020 Enterprise Scheduling system, and as a result they experienced a significant reduction in the use of manual logs and schedules. In addition, the BSA staff was able to better manage patient evaluations workload. This improvement in operational efficiency contributed to the reduction in the patient time spent in the Pre-Admission Testing area by approximately 50%. Based on the BSA premise that longer wait times equates to decreased patient satisfaction, the positive patient experience of a 50% reduction in length of stay has increased the patient satisfaction level.

Pre-Operative Area / Post Operative Stage 2
These two departments are physically the same and share a common staff. Coordination and efficient utilization of resources is critical. It is common that patients return post-operatively to the same room that they were in pre-operatively. Through the combination of automated documentation and the more predictable availability of Pre-Admission Testing information, the overall process in these areas has been streamlined.

The departmental manager was able to rearrange staff schedules based on blocks and scheduling automation. The improvements in these departments contributed an increase in staff satisfaction and a decrease in overtime expenditures.

Intra-Operative Area
BSA determined an on-time start for the first case of the day was critical as it would impact the remainder of the day. BSA also acknowledged a decreased delay in first case starts leads to decreased overtime and that subsequent case throughput was enhanced throughout the day.

BSA initially focused on surgeon arrival times in the hospital. For example, with cases scheduled to start at 0800, the surgeon was expected to arrive by 0730. The surgeon notifies the front desk of his/her arrival and this is marked on the white board and tracked in a spreadsheet for reporting purposes.

The ForSite2020 Surgery Management system, in conjunction with the manual surgeon tracking mechanism, alleviated the need to be reactive to anecdotal information. Use of the system enables the focus to shift from time consuming direct observation and concerning hearsay to more pertinent workflow activities.

First case start times have progressively decreased in average delay time by as much as 18 minutes. In correlation to the Advisory Board’s estimation on delay times, this improvement represents as much as $1,800 of previously unrealized revenue per on-time first case start. In addition successful first case starts contributes positively to consecutive case throughput during the remainder of the day. Although the value of increased throughput has not yet been fully quantified it is deduced the impact is significant and positive.

Final Thoughts

The O.R. Educator had 3 months set aside for completing the training on ForSite2020 prior to go live with Intra-Operative documentation. It actually only took approximately 3 weeks; less than 1/3 the time originally allocated. “It was amazing”.

BSA has improved the communications between employees and employee morale, which BSA believes to have positively impacted care delivery and the overall patient experience. One example was the simple change in a question from “Why isn’t your patient in the room yet?” to “How can I help you get your patient to the room?”

Decreasing overtime expenditures has been a long standing goal of BSA. Since implementing ForSite2020, BSA has been able to decrease overtime expenditures by approximately 2% and expect that improvement to continue. This reduction contributes to increased cost savings, staff satisfaction and an improved patient experience.


About Baptist St. Anthony's Health System:
Baptist St. Anthony’s Health System (BSA) is an extensive hospital system providing clinical excellence to the Texas Panhandle and the tri-state area. BSA is acclaimed for its superior quality and Star Customer Service - compassionate care delivered by a diverse team of skilled professionals and is the fourth largest employer in Amarillo, with a medical staff of more than 450 physicians and 2,700 employees. For more information about Baptist St. Anthony's Health System, visit: http://www.bsahs.org/