North ShoreLong Island Jewish Health System Selects TheraDoc® for Infection Control and Disease Surveillance

SALT LAKE CITY -- Building on its technical expertise in healthcare emergency preparedness, the Great Neck, NY-based North Shore-Long Island Jewish (LIJ) Health System received, through the efforts of Rep. Peter King, a grant from the Department of Defense to expand its already extensive emergency preparedness and bioterrorism surveillance programs. A key component of this effort is strengthening North Shore-LIJs internal surveillance and reporting capabilities regarding infectious pathogens isolated in the health systems laboratories and information generated in the emergency departments.

To support these surveillance activities as well as centralize microbiology data from the 15-hospital health systems various lab systems, North Shore-LIJ has selected TheraDoc® Inc., a clinical informatics company that develops and implements real-time electronic surveillance and expert clinical decision support systems to improve the quality and safety of patient care at the countrys leading hospitals.

In addition to providing North Shore-LIJ with tools for hospital-based internal infection control monitoring and reporting, TheraDoc provides a tailor-made solution for converting our lab systems text-generated microbiology reports into discrete data that is usable for a variety of surveillance and emergency preparedness activities, said Michael Oppenheim, MD, vice president and chief medical information officer for the North Shore-LIJ Health System. Their technology will allow our infection control practitioners to spend more time on prevention and control activities as well as allow us to move our bioterrorism surveillance program to a new level as we implement and expand our surveillance of infectious diseases in our hospitals and communities.

TheraDocs real-time, standards-based infection control software will eliminate the tedious manual review and collection of microbiology and ADT reports. TheraDoc further supports these control measures by providing tools for isolation management and Quick Guides to educate clinical staff on procedures for handling infected patients and preventing the spread of disease. With TheraDoc, North Shore-LIJ will significantly expand its surveillance systems while supporting additional management, control and reporting capabilities all with existing staff.

TheraDoc will also work in tandem with FirstWatch, a real-time early warning system, in supporting key components of emergency preparedness for North Shore-LIJs Center for Emergency Medical Services in Syosset, NY. TheraDocs database will be leveraged by FirstWatch to perform data mining and analysis to identify potential outbreaks, as well as to provide graphic rendering of geographic disease activity in addition to providing real-time automated wireless notifications to emergency preparedness personnel. FirstWatch will also give North Shore-LIJ the ability to collaborate with agencies inside & outside of New York State, in seeing aggregated real-time data related to public health and public safety trends and patterns.

Brian ONeil, senior vice president of emergency medical services, said, In any major outbreak, time is of the essence in containing, isolating and treating illness. These two surveillance platforms, working in conjunction, will provide us the ability to see trends in real-time and respond more quickly. Using these two platforms we can quickly graph disease management from the point of entry into the healthcare system to the point of discharge. Not only does this information assist us with planning and allow us to provide quicker notifications and response, but it makes sound medical sense from an everyday quality perspective.

Source: TheraDoc, Inc.