NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The Bronx RHIO, representing 80 percent of the providers in this borough of 1.36 million residents, went “live” in July, 2008, becoming the first RHIO (regional health information organization) in New York City to begin exchanging patient data. To date, the Bronx RHIO has received consent forms from over 4,000 patients, and has trained 79 “early adopter” clinicians. There are now 55 care locations in the Bronx whose patients’ clinical data can be accessed with appropriate patient consent. These inpatient, outpatient and long term care locations treat 500,000 patients. An additional 70 care sites belonging to other Bronx RHIO participants have “view only” access to patient data.
“The Bronx RHIO is slowly, but steadily, breaking new ground in the improvement of patient care in New York,” said Barbara Radin, executive director. “While other RHIOs in the metro area are under development, we are the first to go live and roll out our system to the benefit of patients. The Bronx represents a very large population by any measure. It is the equivalent of the tenth largest city in the nation, so we are very excited about the scale and the number of patients it will help.”
“This launch puts the Bronx RHIO at the forefront of bringing medical care in the borough into the Information Age,” said Don Ashkenase, executive vice president – corporate, at Montefiore Medical Center and chairman of the Bronx RHIO board. “While many individual health care organizations in the Bronx have established their own electronic medical record systems in recent years, the Bronx RHIO makes possible for the first time the exchange of patient data between these organizations and brings health information technology to many providers who until now have not had access to it.”
“Secure data sharing through the RHIO, especially for a patient who receives care at multiple sites, allows physicians and nurses to instantly view critical patient information from these multiple sources,” said Scott Cooper MD, chief executive officer of St. Barnabas Hospital and a Bronx RHIO board member. “With this integrated patient record, physicians are able to provide better care while preventing prescription errors, avoiding duplicate testing, improving efficiency and reducing costs.”








