Availity Selects Initiate Systems to Enable Accurate Deployment of Payer-Based Electronic Health Record

Business Wire, Feb 21, 2007

Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software to Uniquely Identify More Than 25M Health Records to Create Consolidated Patient Views

CHICAGO -- Initiate Systems, Inc., the recognized standard in enterprise master person index (EMPI) software in the healthcare industry, today announced that Availity, L.L.C. has selected Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software to enable an accurate and complete deployment of its payer-based electronic health record (EHR), the Availity([R]) Care Profile. Availity, a leading healthcare information exchange, who is jointly owned by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida, Humana and Health Care Service Corporation, selected Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software because of the product's unrivaled accuracy, performance and scalability in identity matching and data integration. The Availity Care Profile, which helps to improve patient safety and aids in the elimination of duplicate medical procedures, will use Initiate[TM] software to uniquely identify more than 25 million patient records across multiple data sources to create consolidated health records.

"Patient identity accuracy and on-demand access for every point of care is mission critical to the effectiveness of any Payer-Based Health Record initiative," said Walt Ellenberger vice president, Initiate Systems payer practice. "Initiate software enables a single trusted view of every patient across the entire continuum of care."

Availity's mission is to optimize information sharing between multiple health care stakeholders through a single, secure exchange on a regional basis. Their goal is to strengthen these direct relationships by delivering quality administrative, financial and clinical information to enable a more collaborative approach to health care operation and delivery.

The Availity([R]) Care Profile is a tool which facilitates the presentation of an EHR maintained by health plans that contains claim-based information routinely collected from physicians, pharmacies, labs and other healthcare providers. Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software will integrate this claim-based patient data into one consolidated view, enabling healthcare professionals to access a patient's complete history from data located throughout the healthcare system.

"It was important that we select an EMPI provider that offered sophisticated technology that could accurately identify information on a large-scale and perform in real-time. It was equally important to select a partner who understands the healthcare business and can help overcome its challenges," said Jon McBride, Chief Technology Officer at Availity. "Initiate met these requirements and is now a core technology of Availity's system -- which processes hundreds of millions of healthcare transactions each year."

Initiate Systems provides software and services for healthcare organizations that want to deliver a comprehensive view of each patient in real time to all points of service. Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software is the most accurate, scalable and rapidly implemented EMPI solution available for healthcare providers, integrated delivery networks (IDNs), independent physicians associations and regional health information organizations (RHIOs), that want to improve patient identification and customer satisfaction, protect data privacy and security, enable interoperability and provide a critical foundation for EHR implementations. Initiate[TM] software and Initiate(SM) services enable strategic initiatives that allow healthcare organizations to improve patient safety and care, provide new services and ensure regulatory compliance.

For more information on Initiate Systems or Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software, please visit www.initiatesystems.com.

About Availity, L.L.C. - Patients. Not paperwork.[R]

Availity optimizes the flow of information between multiple health care stakeholders through a single, secure internet-based exchange. The Availity[R] Health Information Network encompasses administrative, financial and clinical services, supports both real-time and batch transactions via the Web and electronic data interchange (EDI), and is HIPAA compliant. Visit www.availity.com or call 1-800-AVAILITY (282-4548).

About Initiate Systems

Initiate Systems, Inc. is the leading provider of customer-centric master data management solutions for companies and government agencies that want to create the most complete, real-time views of people, households and organizations from data dispersed across multiple application systems and databases. Initiate Identity Hub[TM] software is more accurate, scalable, rapidly deployed and widely-used than any other solution. Many organizations in the financial services, government, healthcare, hospitality and retail sectors are using Initiate[TM] software to deliver the right data at the right time to all critical touch points. Initiate Systems' proven experience makes it uniquely qualified to enable strategic initiatives that allow organizations to increase revenue and efficiency and reduce operating costs and risks. Initiate Systems operates globally through its subsidiaries, with corporate headquarters in Chicago and offices across the U.S., a Canadian office in Toronto, an EMEA office in London and a Pacific Rim office in Sydney.