MercyAscot, one of New Zealand’s leading private healthcare providers, has signed contracts with two IT providers, InterSystems and Umbrellar, in a major step towards replacing and extending its existing patient administration and clinical information systems.

“When we saw the need to replace our administrative and clinical systems, a central element in our Digital Health strategy, we wanted a unified system that would help improve delivery of care for our patients while enabling our clinicians and other staff to perform at their very best. We wanted a long-term partnership with providers who could offer thought leadership and support, to help us to digitally transform,” says MercyAscot Chief Executive Dr Geoff Sparkes.

The selected partners are InterSystems, a global leader in health information technology, and Umbrellar, a New Zealand-based Cloud computing company that specialises in digital transformation. MercyAscot has selected InterSystems TrakCare electronic medical record (EMR).

“Through the implementation of TrakCare, MercyAscot will transform care delivery and streamline operational and clinical processes,” said Kerry Stratton, Managing Director Asia Pacific at InterSystems.

“TrakCare will enable clinicians at MercyAscot to make informed decisions more quickly and improve safety, efficiency and patient experience.”

MercyAscot knew it needed to leverage cloud computing capabilities to deliver benefits in interoperability, potential long-term scalability, and a data platform with the capability to unlock actionable insights from patient data.

“We are excited that, by working with our staff over two years to scope this project and understand their needs, and by engaging with these two expert providers, MercyAscot has been able to achieve this key milestone.

“We are starting recruitment for three pivotal project, technical and change management positions to guide our digital transformation.  We expect to launch this project in January 2019 and look forward to its full realisation in a couple of years,” says Dr Sparkes.