It hardly seems possible that it was 16 months ago when I stood on stage alongside the CEOs of athenahealth, Cerner, Greenway and McKesson to announce this industry-led endeavor for interoperability. As with many things, it seems like such a short time to have accomplished all that we have.
The now nine members of the CommonWell Health Alliance really have made amazing progress since we announced at HIMSS in March 2013. We welcomed new founding members representing important healthcare segments such as lab (Sunquest) and rural/community/critical-access hospitals (CPSI). We welcomed new contributing members representing other critical segments such as pharmacy (CVS) and psychiatric/behavioral/LTAC (MedHost). We published services and use case specifications, launched services at 14 sites in four communities and enrolled more than 10,000 patients in the CommonWell database. And most of that happened before we even hit the year mark.
It has been a whirlwind of activity and achievements. We tried to capture the highlights in our 2014 annual report and complementary video. I hope you will take a chance to look at both. Like me, I think you will be impressed with all that we have accomplished.
We hope you will come back often to read all about it, and feel free to share some of your favorite CommonWell memories of this past year with us as well.
Rich Elmore, vice president Corporate Development and Strategy – Allscripts and vice chairman of the Board – CommonWell Health Alliance