Successful Integrated Care Healthcare Pilot Sets Scene for Singapore Rollout

March 25, 2009 - PRLog -- Auckland, New Zealand - Health software company HSAGlobal, leading Asian healthcare provider Singapore General Hospital/Singapore Health Services and Asia’s leading telco Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) have completed a successful pilot of HSAGlobal’s Community Care Management Solution (CCMS). CCMS is an electronic health record and case management system that makes integrated patient information available at the point-of-care via PC, laptop, tablet or mobile devices.

The pilot involved teams of clinicians across selected Singapore General Hospital wards and SingHealth Specialist Outpatient Clinics and Polyclinics using CCMS to manage the care of over 200 complex, chronically-ill diabetic patients.  Patients could also access their own health record in the system and add and update their measurements and results via a secure patient web portal.

Based on the successful outcomes of the project, CCMS will be implemented across Singapore General Hospital’s wards and Specialist Outpatient Clinics, and SingHealth Polyclinics.  Planning has also begun for the broader rollout to other public and community providers in Singapore in line with the national strategy.  

In other key markets, CCMS is available through local service providers Fujitsu in Australia and TELUS in Canada.

Professor Ng Han Seong, Chairman, Medical Board, Singapore General Hospital said: "As people age, they develop complex and multiple medical conditions. The responsibility of care in the community, for chronic diseases, is shared between hospital specialists, primary care physicians, nurse practitioners, patients and their families.  We must therefore leverage on technology and design care delivery systems to facilitate the effective discharge of care across the healthcare continuum."

HSAGlobal President and Chief Executive Officer Mr. Matt Hector-Taylor says that management of clients with long term conditions when they are outside hospital walls is an increasingly important but complex and fragmented area of the health sector globally.  

“The burden of chronic and long term conditions on the healthcare system worldwide is extreme and getting worse quickly.  Scalable, modern, standards-oriented solutions that support integrated care delivery between secondary, primary and community-based clinicians and the clients they care for will be essential to manage the ever-increasing demand for care within the limited resources available.

Mr Bill Chang, SingTel’s Executive Vice President for Business, said: “CCMS transforms the way healthcare providers operate through the innovative use of Infocomm Technology (ICT).  By setting a new benchmark in healthcare, we believe CCMS is the model for the industry to follow.”

“As the solution is hosted and fully managed by SingTel, healthcare providers need not worry about complex technology issues, obsolescence, system maintenance, security concerns and IT staff costs.  This allows caregivers to reduce overheads and focus their efforts on providing high quality patient care,” says Mr Chang.

In Canada, telecommunications giant TELUS is the exclusive service provider for HSAGlobal. TELUS manages the hosting of CCMS, along with all infrastructure including devices, network, platform, and billing. TELUS is uniquely positioned in ICT to enable a true transformation of healthcare in Canada.

In Australia, Fujitsu is the exclusive service provider for HSAGlobal. Fujitsu delivers the software as a service, including all data centre services, support desk and Microsoft applications.  Australia is one of four countries on Fujitsu’s global health steering committee. Fujitsu is the world's third-largest IT services provider.

The solution is offered through the hosted Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) model for a monthly subscription fee.  The SaaS model eliminates the need for heavy upfront capital investments and high on-going maintenance costs, making it a very attractive proposition for both large and small healthcare providers.  As a mobile solution, it is it ideal for the treatment of home-bound clients and the elderly.

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About HSAGlobal
HSAGlobal builds and distributes the Healthphone suite of healthcare software products for integrated care and long term condition management. Our products address the needs of providers and clients in the home & community care, long term & aged care, mental healthcare, and chronic care sectors. HSAGlobal conducts business in New Zealand, Australia, Canada and Singapore, with staff and Service Provider partners in each country. HSAGlobal also has customers in the United States. Corporate headquarters and research & development are based in Auckland, New Zealand.