COLUMBUS, Ga. and WATERTOWN, Mass., Oct. 15, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) -- athenahealth, Inc. (Nasdaq:ATHN), a leading provider of Internet-based business services to physician practices, today announced that The Hughston Clinic, P.C., one of the nation's leading orthopedic surgery groups, has selected athenahealth's on-demand EMR service, athenaClinicals(sm), for its nine locations throughout Georgia and Alabama. The clinic is also utilizing athenaCollector(sm), athenahealth's physician billing and practice management service, which is fully integrated with athenaClinicals(sm) and is designed to optimize clinical and operational workflows across all practice locations.
"Since going live on athenahealth's practice management service we have experienced close to a 70 percent increase in collections. With athenaClinicals being built on the same network-based platform as athenahealth's practice management service, we believe it will allow our group to further integrate our administrative and clinical workflow, further empowering our staff and streamlining overall operations," said Dr. John I. Waldrop, President of The Hughston Clinic.
athenaClinicals provides the features physicians expect from a traditional EMR software system while also converting the massive amounts of analog information found in a medical practice -- faxes, phone calls, patient encounters, etc. -- into continuously updated clinical profiles and workflows, aimed at eliminating paper and improving execution of key clinical processes such as labs, prescriptions, referrals and health maintenance.
"The Hughston Clinic is one of the nation's leading orthopedic centers because it focuses on continual improvement of patient care. In pursuing excellence, they see the need to leverage clinical and operational services to achieve greater efficiency and effectiveness while arming their staff with real-time information," said Jonathan Bush, Chairman and CEO of athenahealth. "athenahealth's on-demand business services are delivered via a single Internet-based application, a shared rules knowledgebase and integrated back office service operations that allow the experience of each practice to benefit the entire national client network."
Dr. Waldrop continued, "With nine facilities in two states we felt the need to reduce the volumes of paper we receive on both the clinical and billing fronts. A critical factor in selecting athenahealth's EMR service was its ability to help manage our practices' workflow and reduce administrative errors by intercepting all inbound faxes and reports, converting them into electronic documents, and then categorizing them into the physician workflow."
About The Hughston Clinic
The Hughston Clinic is an Orthopaedic specialty medical practice based in Columbus Georgia and an internationally recognized center of excellence for Orthopaedic Sports Medicine and Total Joint Arthroplasty. Founded in 1949 by senior partner Jack C. Hughston, the clinic operates satellite offices in Georgia and Alabama, offering advanced level practitioners in every subspecialty of orthopaedic surgery. The main campus in Columbus Georgia also includes a freestanding foundation devoted to research and education. For more information, please visit www.hughston.com or contact (800) 331-2910.
About athenahealth
athenahealth is a leading provider of internet-based business services for physician practices. The Company's service offerings are based on proprietary web-native practice management electronic medical record (EMR) software, a continuously updated payer knowledge-base and integrated back-office service operations. For more information visit www.athenahealth.com or call (888) 652-8200.
This press release contains forward-looking statements which are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements regarding the benefits of the Company's service offerings. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees, and are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond our control, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those contemplated in these forward-looking statements. In particular, the risks and uncertainties include, among other things: the risk that our services offerings will not operate in the manner that we expect, due to design flaws, security breaches or otherwise; potential interruptions or delays in our internet-based services offerings; our reliance upon third parties, such as computer hardware, software, data-hosting and internet infrastructure providers, which reliance may result in failures or disruptions in our service offerings through no fault of our own; errors or omissions included in our payer and clinical intelligence rules engine and database; and the evolving and complex government regulatory compliance environment in which we and our clients operate. Existing and prospective investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. athenahealth, Inc. undertakes no obligation to update or revise the information contained in this press release, whether as a result of new information, future events or circumstances or otherwise. For additional disclosure regarding these and other risks faced by athenahealth, Inc., see the disclosure contained in our public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission.