Louisville, KY, Aug. 24, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Appriss Health, provider of the most comprehensive platform for substance use disorder in the U.S., today announced it has recently signed an agreement with the Indiana Professional Licensing Agency, the entity that manages the Indiana Scheduled Prescription Electronic Collection and Tracking (INSPECT) program, which addresses the problem of prescription drug abuse and diversion in Indiana, to enable integration of controlled substance prescription information into electronic health records (EHRs) and pharmacy management systems statewide. Appriss Health’s PMP Gateway enables access to data, analytics, insights, tools and resources from prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) within care team workflows in real-time, at the point-of-care, to improve patient safety and outcomes.
Today at the Indiana Commission to Combat Drug Abuse, Indiana Governor Eric J. Holcomb announced that the statewide integration of the INSPECT platform is a key component of Indiana’s ongoing efforts to attack the opioid crisis.
“INSPECT helps healthcare professionals around the state limit the number of controlled-substance prescriptions that contribute to our state’s devastating drug crisis,” Gov. Holcomb said. “I commend Indiana’s Professional Licensing Agency, Board of Pharmacy and Appriss Health for their hard work and partnership to make a statewide platform for INSPECT possible.”
The Indiana Professional Licensing Agency (IPLA) began this project in 2016 when it first partnered with Appriss Health to examine how to make INSPECT data more effective and accessible for healthcare practitioners. In the year that followed, IPLA partnered with Kroger Pharmacy to introduce the program into its pharmacy software. Most recently, Deaconess Midtown in Evansville became the first hospital in the state to integrate its electronic health records with INSPECT data. The response from both Deaconess and Kroger has been overwhelmingly positive, as physicians and pharmacists alike have praised the ease of use and efficiency of the new model.
The benefits of EHR and pharmacy management system integrations into state PDMPs have been widely-recognized as beneficial to improving patient safety, mitigating drug diversion and ensuring compliance.
PMP Gateway is a managed service platform that provides comprehensive connectivity, clinical decision support, patient support, patient engagement and care coordination that interoperates seamlessly with leading EHR and pharmacy management systems. Prior to PMP Gateway, prescribers and pharmacists had to log into separate software solutions to retrieve a patient's prescription history and then cross-reference that data with a patient's health information in other systems creating a cumbersome and inefficient process for the practitioners. Once a healthcare organization integrates INSPECT, practitioners need only click a button to view prescription history.
“We are honored to work with the Governor, our community healthcare partners, and Appriss Health on statewide integration. Every practitioner and dispenser should have access to this program, as it can be a vital tool for addressing opioid abuse and misuse,” said Deborah Frye, Executive Director of the Indiana Professional Licensing Agency. “The IPLA and the state of Indiana hope this new PDMP advancement will improve the health and safety of patients and serve as a resource to prescribers and dispensers in the coming years.”
Indiana is now the seventh state in the nation committed to implementing a statewide, enterprise license for in-workflow PDMP integration. Other states that have implemented a statewide, enterprise license for Appriss Health’s PMP Gateway solution include: Arizona, Kansas, Massachusetts, Michigan, Ohio and Virginia.
“All Hoosiers should be very proud of their Governor, state government, local hospitals and health systems and pharmacies for recognizing the importance of integrating PDMP information directly into clinical workflow,” said Rob Cohen, president, Appriss Health. “Bottomline; we believe that when you put the right information, in the right hands, at the right time, in the right place – the EHR and pharmacy management systems – we know that PDMP and related information usage increases, which ultimately saves lives.”
PDMP data, analytics and more are now integrated into physician and pharmacist workflow through EHRs and pharmacy management systems in 27 states with Appriss Health solutions and more than 18 million transactions are now completed per month on its platform. Last year, PDMP queries rose 66 percent in states that use Appriss Health solutions, compared with a 24 percent increase in the few states using homegrown systems, American Medical Association data shows.
Additionally, Appriss Health’s PDMP solutions are currently live in 42 states and municipalities, including Indiana, and accounted for 84 percent of U.S. prescriber’s opioid-related queries to state PDMPs last year, according to data collected by the American Medical Association.
About Appriss Health
Appriss Health provides the nation's most comprehensive platform for early identification, prevention and management of substance use disorder (SUD). We provide state government agencies with the most advanced repository of controlled substance dispensing data, and deliver real-time clinical decisioning support, critical insights and interventions to physicians, pharmacists, and care team members through millions of patient encounters each year. Our solutions enable healthcare providers, pharmacists and care team members to assess and manage clinical risk in order to positively impact patient safety and population health outcomes. For more information, please visit www.apprisshealth.com.
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