SSM Health First Health Care System to Adopt Surescripts National Record Locator Service

NRLS ENABLES MORE THAN 10,000 SSM HEALTH CLINICIANS IN ILLINOIS, MISSOURI AND OKLAHOMA TO LOCATE PATIENT RECORDS FROM OTHER SYSTEMS IN REAL-TIME

ARLINGTON, Va. – May 23, 2016 – SSM Health, a Catholic not-for-profit health system based in St. Louis, is the first organization to go live with Surescripts National Record Locator Service (NRLS). Announced earlier this year, the service gives more than 10,000 SSM Health clinicians in Illinois, Missouri and Oklahoma an effective way to locate patient records and obtain a more complete view of the health of a patient in the Epic electronic health record (EHR), regardless of where the patient received care. As part of the leading nationwide health information network, Surescripts National Record Locator Service covers 2 billion patient interactions for 140 million patients nationwide.

SSM Health clinicians will use the National Record Locator Service to quickly and efficiently locate and share patient records across disparate systems, geographies and technologies. Now, when patients visit SSM Health, their doctors can see all the hospitals and clinics they have visited outside of SSM Health. This information helps doctors know exactly where to go to retrieve critical information that can improve the safety and quality of care.

“When a patient arrives in one of our emergency departments, urgent care clinics or physician’s offices, Surescripts National Record Locator Service enables the care team to access valuable clinical information from other providers who have previously treated the patient, regardless of where they received care or the electronic health record software used,” said Richard Vaughn, MD, Chief Medical Information Officer for SSM Health. “By having a more complete care history, we can make faster and better decisions, avoid reordering expensive tests and help ensure that our patients receive the best care possible.”

“Now more than ever, it is crucial for healthcare providers and organizations such as SSM Health to be armed with critical patient information at the point of care,” said Tom Skelton, Chief Executive Officer of Surescripts. “Our National Record Locator Service is breaking down the barriers to truly connecting healthcare, by sharing valuable, life-saving information in real-time.”

Operating under the Carequality framework, and integrated with Epic’s Care Everywhere interoperability platform, Surescripts National Record Locator Service integrates seamlessly with SSM Health’s physician workflow.