Louisville, KY, July 31, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Appriss Health, provider of the most comprehensive platform for substance use disorder in the U.S., today announced that since it entered into an agreement one year ago with the Kansas State Board of Pharmacy and the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to provide all prescribers and pharmacists in Kansas with access to K-TRACS, the Kansas prescription drug monitoring program (PDMP), directly in electronic health record (EHR) and pharmacy management systems via Appriss Health’s PMP Gateway solution, also known as INTEGRx8.
There are now more than 100 health systems, hospitals, physician’s offices, and pharmacies integrated or in-process in Kansas, including 29 hospitals that are live today.
“With this integration initiative, we are better able to provide Kansas’ prescribers and pharmacists with easier access to K-TRACS which improves clinical decision support, patient support, patient engagement, and care coordination within their workflow – critical information is becoming available for every patient encounter with just one click,” said Kansas State Board of Pharmacy Executive Secretary Alexandra Blasi. “Integrations are now complete with most major EHRs and pharmacy system vendors, making implementations quick and easy for interested healthcare entities and pharmacies in Kansas. We encourage these providers to sign up today for INTGRx8 by visiting our website (see below) and do their part to focus on what matters: providing excellent care to patients in Kansas.”
The statewide integration of K-TRACS into EHRs and pharmacy management systems at the point-of-care, in real-time, every time a patient encounter occurs, increases the availability, ease of access and use of K-TRACS for making critical clinical decisions, such as prescribing and dispensing, and referral to treatment decisions. Without INTEGRx8, prescribers and pharmacists must log in to separate systems to query patient information which takes important time away from patient care. Integrations simplify the patient query process by making K-TRACS directly available to prescribers and pharmacists in their daily workflow.
The first hospital and pharmacy to go live, respectively, were Lawrence Memorial Hospital on the Cerner platform and Degoler Pharmacy on the QS/1 platform. Some of the most recent go-lives include: Stormont Vail Health on the Epic platform, Newton Medical Center on the DrFirst platform, First Care Clinic on the NextGen platform, and Dandurand Pharmacy on the Transaction Data Systems/Rx30 platform. There are a number of other platforms that have been integrated in Kansas, as well.
Appriss Health is now partnering with more than 90 vendors across the U.S. to develop and deploy solutions for the integration of PDMPs into clinical workflow. There are live integrations in 35 states today, and more than 30 million integration transactions are now completed per month via PMP Gateway.
“Over the last year, healthcare providers and pharmacists in Kansas have been playing a more involved and important role by intervening for patient safety – easily, earlier and often – as well as mitigating potential controlled substance abuse and drug diversion as a result of these K-TRACS integrations in clinical workflow,” said Rob Cohen, President, Appriss Health. “We sincerely appreciate their efforts, and those of the Kansas State Board of Pharmacy, as does every citizen of Kansas, known and unknown, that has been, is, or might someday be, adversely affected by the opioid epidemic.”
Kansas, along with Arizona, Indiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia are all states that have implemented a statewide, enterprise license for Appriss Health’s PMP Gateway solution for clinical workflow integrations. A statewide, enterprise license for PMP Gateway is by far the most cost effective method of integrations available today.
Since their inception, PDMPs have proven to be effective in combating prescription drug abuse and misuse nationwide. However, integrating PDMP information, analytics, insights, and resources into EHRs and pharmacy management system workflows is a critical step in the progression of optimizing the use of PDMPs—and it is happening today.
For more information and to request an integration in Kansas, please visit http://ktracs.ks.gov.
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 information, and deliver real-time clinical decision 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.