EvergreenHealth recognized among U.S. News & World Report’s Most Connected Hospitals

Published 7:00 am Tuesday, October 20, 2015

EvergreenHealth has earned distinction from U.S. News & World Report as a Most Connected Hospital in 2015-16, which places the Kirkland-based health system among just 159 hospitals nationwide for its advances in electronic connectedness that improve safety and patient experience.

To be named a Most Connected Hospital, EvergreenHealth demonstrated commitment to health care’s ongoing digital revolution within three critical areas – clinical connectedness, patient safety, and patient engagement – which was evaluated through an annual IT survey administered by the American Hospital Association (AHA). Hospitals that earned the highest scores on the survey in addition to achieving a high performance rating from U.S. News were recognized among this year’s leaders in digital connectivity and clinical excellence.

“As health care technology rapidly evolves it’s critical for integrated systems like ours to keep pace in ways that improve safety, empower patients with information about their care and make it easy to share information quickly and seamlessly,” said EvergreenHealth CEO Bob Malte. “We’re proud to be recognized for these achievements and remain committed to continuing to implement digital solutions that improve health care delivery.”

To evaluate connectivity, U.S. News considered a hospital’s clinical connectedness, or ability to exchange information with any provider, as one of the most important indicators of commitment to technology with its performance in this area counting toward half of its total score.

Advances in patient safety through digital means, such as using bar-coded wrist bracelets to verify identity prior to administering medication, accounted for one-third of its score. Patient engagement, or enlisting patients in their own care with the use of technology, was worth about one-fifth of a hospital’s total score.

Among its latest advances, EvergreenHealth recently joined several other health care technology companies to address its most challenging business problems through startup partnerships, providing innovative entrepreneurs an opportunity to align products and solutions with the needs of enterprise. The organization evaluated pitches from several entrepreneurial teams and recently selected a finalist launching a pilot to improve the health care space with a web-based productivity suite enabling any provider to seamlessly connect apps, devices and services to improve workflow and delivery of care.

A full list of the U.S. News & World Report Most Connected Hospitals and report methodology is available at www.usnews.com/mostconnected.

For more information about EvergreenHealth, visit www.evergreenhealth.com or call 425-899-3000.