These improvements were made possible when Singapore Health Services (SingHealth), the largest cluster of public healthcare institutions in Singapore, first transformed the outlook of healthcare delivery with the pioneering concept of integrating patient medical records with the roll-out of the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system across all its 3 hospitals, 4 National Centres and 8 Polyclinics. To date, more than 2.1 million patient medical records and 19.3 million visit records have been efficiently stored and effectively deployed electronically across the SingHealth institutions since EMR was first introduced in 2002.

SingHealth’s commitment to optimise technology to improve patient care has brought on a partnership with iSOFT Group plc, the leading global supplier of application solutions for healthcare organisations, to launch the next generation of IT solutions using iSOFT’s new EMR application called LORENZO. This strategic alliance was just recently sealed in an agreement on 18 August 2005.

Leveraging on its existing successful track record of EMR solutions, SingHealth is poised to roll out even more robust IT capabilities to provide improved clinical quality and patient outcomes, enhanced patient safety, greater cost-savings for patients, and better work efficiency across its institutions.

As one of iSOFT’s Global Innovation Partners, SingHealth is able to actively contribute to the ongoing and future development of LORENZO to design new features that place the patient at the centre of each process.

The second phase of EMR will include new capabilities such as:-

1. Outpatient Summaries

2. Electronic ordering of laboratory and radiology tests

3. Streamlined process and view of Inpatient Medication Administration

4. Online and integrated prescription ordering by doctors

5. Clinical Documentation and Clinical Pathways provide valuable patient data

6. Problem lists which reveal and streamline patient information

The new EMR upgrade is designed to efficiently improve use of resources and patient information to bring about greater benefits for both patients and SingHealth institutions such as:-

• Enhanced patient safety or reduced patient risk through improved legibility of orders

• Cost-savings through the elimination of unnecessary lab and radiology procedures, blood tests etc

• Improved patient outcomes with evidence-based treatment and consistent practice

• Reduce length of stay (LOS) due to improved communication and integrated care treatment among care providers

• Continuous improvement of quality care and patient service through error monitoring & elimination of unnecessary procedures

• Savings of time and effort that would otherwise be spent on correcting lost and illegible orders

• More readily-available information and data of patients for healthcare professionals to make faster critical decisions

Following extensive evaluation of leading healthcare application vendors worldwide, SingHealth decided on iSOFT as the preferred supplier earlier this year. The ability to capitalise on SingHeath’s existing investment in iSOFT’s technology is seen as a key benefit for the organisation.

Said Mr TK Udairam, SingHealth’s IT Steering Committee Chairman and CEO of Changi General Hospital, "In the medical world today, IT is an absolutely critical platform that allows the efficient delivery of high quality, integrated and multi-disciplinary health care. It has been a challenging but liberating journey for SingHealth since we embarked on the EMR initiative three years ago. SingHealth’s investment in the EMR project has also since brought significant value to both the patients and internal users at SingHealth. The iSOFT partnership will give us the advantage of a more robust and flexible technical architecture for SingHealth institutions to transit and migrate to a new platform without any disruptions to patients and users. This means SingHealth can protect its current IT investment while expanding its capabilities and new functionality from LORENZO."

Professor Tan Ser Kiat, Group CEO of SingHealth added, "At SingHealth, we are working towards a patient-centric digital health ecosystem and in it the "Holy Grail" of healthcare IT is a total digitisation of care. We have already started to harness IT in clinical decision making, an example of which is our efforts in establishing an integrated IT support for the six chronic disease health management programmes (HMP) across the SingHealth cluster. This HMP IT Support will demonstrate capabilities that can help optimise health care delivery by leveraging on evidence-based clinical pathways, epidemiologic models and genomic medicine. By leveraging on a robust EMR platform, the HMP IT Support will make it easier for our clinicians and healthcare workers to proactively monitor patients’ progress and make better decisions. This is part of SingHealth’s ongoing efforts to explore better and more cost-effective ways to provide quality and safe healthcare services for patients."

Commenting on the partnership Tim Whiston, iSOFT Chief Executive Officer said: "Our Global Innovation Partners are carefully selected from organisations at the forefront of healthcare, realising the reforms necessary to manage the provision of leading-edge care. The input we receive from these important partners serves to maintain iSOFT’s application leadership position to the benefit of our customers and the citizens they serve. Working with SingHealth we will create an exciting new international reference for LORENZO."

-Ends-

SingHealth – is the largest healthcare group in Singapore, offering a complete range of integrated services to over 3 million patients. The group consists of 3 Hospitals, 5 National Specialist Centres and a network of 9 polyclinics. We are dedicated to providing quality healthcare that is affordable and accessible to our patients. At SingHealth, we are guided by our shared values of Clinical Excellence, Commitment and Collaboration to provide Genuine Care to all our patients.

Since its inception in 2000, SingHealth has pursued a strategy of standardized and consolidated information technology services. The cluster aims to create a "SingHealth Digital Health Ecosystem". In early 2002, a cluster IT steering committee was set up as a further enhancement to this consolidation, to oversee the prioritization and approval of all IT initiatives. Together with its doctors and healthcare professionals, SingHealth reviewed and embarked on several key IT initiatives that would achieve and provide:-

1. Better Clinical outcomes

2. Enhanced Patient Safety

3. Improved and integrate patient care and services

4. Increased efficiency in terms of better knowledge management and resource allocation

Hospitals : Changi General Hospital, KK Women's and Children's Hospital and Singapore General Hospital

National Specialist Centres : National Cancer Centre, National Dental Centre, National Heart Centre, National Neuroscience Institute, and Singapore National Eye Centre

SingHealth Polyclinics : Bedok, Bukit Merah, Geylang, Marine Parade, Outram, Pasir Ris, Queenstown, Sengkang and Tampines

For more information please contact:

Joan Lew

SingHealth

Tel: +65 65574914

joan.lew@singhealth.com.sg

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

For more information please contact:

Alex Gray iSOFT Group plc

Tel: +44 (0)161 490 2777 alex.gray@isoftplc.com

Fax: +44 (0)161 499 2933