Dr. Dhiren Sutaria of Woodland Internists (part of Winchester Hospital IPA) became the second practice to successfully implement the Alpha version of athenaClinicals. To our great excitement, Dr. Sutaria and his staff were using the document workflow - the first phase of athenaClinicals - without support or supervision before the end of the first day. (We had originally planned for five days of ramping up!) The remainder of the implementation, the online encounter workflow, was put in place early this month.

This smooth, successful implementation closely mirrors the experience of Dr. Eugene Constantinou (see photo at right), an internal medicine practice that was the first to transition to the Alpha version of athenaClinicals - also in record time and with minimal disruption to the practice.

athenaClinicals is the world's first "clinical cycle management service" – combining web-based clinical software, knowledge, and work to deliver far more dependable returns-on-investment to practices than traditional electronic medical records have been able to do. The day you go live with athenaClinicals is the day you've seen your last fax, filed your last chart, and typed your last note – regardless of where you order from, or what labs you use.

With athenaClinicals, Dr. Sutaria and his staff are now viewing all new clinical documents and results online, managing clinical tasks online and submitting orders online. All of this work is captured as part of the new online medical record. athena has taken over all paperwork coming to the practice, including faxes and mail. We scan images (which are available to practices) and perform data entry to codify the information in the medical record and make the information available electronically. And all patient conversations are now documented electronically in each patient's record for physician review.

Dr. Sutaria especially enjoys having instant access to a wide range of information about his patients, from lab results to progress notes. Another bonus – even this early in the implementation process – is that practice staff have more time to devote to clinical care and administration, without the need to continually pull and re-file charts, call pharmacies, and other time-consuming tasks.

The online encounter aspect of the workflow, installed this month, will enable patient encounter information to be captured electronically and systematically.

Next month, Bethel Medical in Brockton, MA (a practice with multiple providers) will begin using the Alpha version of athenaClinicals. In the second quarter, athena will begin to install our proud, 200-member Beta Class with the Beta Version of athenaClinicals.

If you'd like more information about athenaClinicals, please e-mail athenaclinicals@athenahealth.com.