Advocate Health Care System Signs 2nd Contract with PerfectServe

Knoxville, TN – Advocate Lutheran General Hospital, part of the Advocate Health Care System, recently signed an agreement to utilize PerfectServe’s clinical communications system. This is PerfectServe’s second contract with the 11-hospital Advocate Health Care System, the largest integrated health system in the state of Illinois and one of the nation’s top ten health systems.

PerfectServe enables hospitals and physician practices to eliminate communication breakdowns and improve the coordination of care. The first Advocate hospital to use this system was Advocate Good Shepherd in Barrington, Ill.

“PerfectServe will help physicians maximize their time, minimize their hassles and enable us to stay connected, physician-to-physician as well as physician-to-hospital,” said Anthony A. Armada, president of Lutheran General. “With health care reform changing payment requirements, tighter coordination between hospitals and their medical staffs is critical. With PerfectServe, we will achieve better connection among physicians, which will help facilitate our transition to an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) model.”

“PerfectServe will be our backbone for reliable and timely communications that are instrumental in achieving the best possible patient outcomes,” noted Dr. Michael McKenna, chief medical officer at Lutheran General.

According to Armada, “PerfectServe aligns with our notion of being ‘always the best,’ in outcomes, our practice environment, our workplace environment and the value we provide to the communities we serve.”

Added Dr. McKenna, “PerfectServe will help us stand out in the marketplace as a ‘best place to practice’ because it shows physicians we’re doing something different to make their lives easier and help them be more effective.”

Located in Park Ridge, Ill., Lutheran General Hospital is a 645-bed tertiary, quaternary care, academic and research hospital, a Level I trauma center and one of the largest hospitals in the Chicago area. It is also home to Advocate Lutheran General Children’s Hospital, the only children’s hospital in the northwest suburbs and a major regional referral center for a broad range of infant and pediatric services.

“The Advocate Health System and Lutheran General have solid reputations for quality, which PerfectServe will help support,” said Terry Edwards, chief executive officer of PerfectServe. “We look forward to helping the hospital’s clinicians improve their efficiency, reduce risk and enhance their ability to coordinate care.”

PerfectServe has four core capabilities that facilitate fast, accurate and reliable communications that benefit hospitals and their clinicians:•A physician-centric, rules-based communications workflow engine that allows physicians to filter and control the communications they receive based on their practice workflow and personal contact preferences.

•A single network platform and directory that connects every medical staff member with easy access via voice search, Web and mobile interfaces.

•An integrated practice component that enables physicians to control the flow of communications received through their offices.

•Mobile tools and a 24/7 help center staffed with clinical communications experts who make it easy for physicians to keep their rules current and optimize their communications workflow.

“We are encouraged by the fact that more hospitals like Lutheran General have recognized that improving clinical communications, especially when it involves the complex workflow of physicians, is at the heart of improving efficiency and the coordination of care,” added Edwards.

About Advocate Lutheran General Hospital Advocate Lutheran General Hospital is one of the most nationally recognized hospitals in the greater north and northwest suburban region of Chicago. Besides its numerous rankings as a 100 Top Hospital and top teaching institution, it was rated for ten years by US News & World Report as one of America’s best hospitals and was rated top 50 in the nation in many specialties. In addition, Lutheran General was selected for the fourth time as one of the nation’s top cardiovascular hospitals, according to the Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals: Cardiovascular Benchmarks study.

About PerfectServe

PerfectServe offers intelligent voice, online and mobile clinical communication solutions that route calls and messages to the right doctor, at the right time. It gives physicians complete control over the communications they receive while enabling hospital clinicians to expedite and improve care coordination. Based in Knoxville, Tenn., PerfectServe processes more than 30 million clinical communication interactions each year involving more than 15,500 physicians in 154 markets across the U.S. For more information, visit www.perfectserve.com.