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Orion Health has introduced an Apple iOS app that allows doctors to view historical patient data from health information exchanges. The company also introduced a new platform that allows health organizations to customize mobile apps.
Orion provides the technology infrastructure for many state and regional HIEs.
Launched on Dec. 18, Orion Health Mobile allows doctors to customize patient work lists to view results of clinical data searches in the company’s portal. Orion’s application architecture enables doctors to drill down to relevant patient data and mark important information using a single click.
Orion Health Mobile is now available for the iPhone, and the company will add compatibility for the iPad tablet in the future.
“The Orion Health Mobile app helps clinical workflows by allowing providers to review assigned tasks and allowing them to complete and sign off on these tasks, such as reviewing new results, while on the move between clinical settings and away from workstations,” Chris Stevens, vice president of product management at Orion Health, told eWEEK in an email.
Doctors manage these patient work lists manually or automatically, he said. They can add or remove rules from the work lists based on their needs.
The work lists are identical to those in Orion Health’s HIE, said Stevens. Orion Health HIE provides single sign-on to a clinical portal to access electronic health records. It also offers secure direct messaging among providers.
Almost all states and local health departments use Orion Health Rhapsody Integration Engine for public health reporting, according to the company. Rhapsody Integration Engine integrates with Orion Health’s HIE software.
In addition, Orion’s new Mobile Enablement Platform, also announced on Dec. 18, enables hospitals to customize mobile apps to aid their clinical care. One company recently used the platform to create an app for parents to view a child’s health information on an iPhone or Android device.
Orion’s new mobile tools are part of its strategy to deliver “flexible, extensible HIE platforms,” Paul Viskovich, president of Orion Health North America, said in a statement. “These enhancements ensure that Orion Health HIE users can fully leverage the power of mobile health applications to foster closer care coordination, increased clinician efficiency and enhanced patient care.”
The HIE platform provides the interface for doctors to access clinical data on mobile devices.
“Orion Health has expanded the architecture [to] provide RESTful APIs, which enable the creation of specific applications both by Orion Health and third parties targeted toward specific clinical problems,” said Stevens.
As doctors integrate more mobile technology into their practices and hospital workflows, security is an ongoing challenge. Orion worked with Apple to ensure the security of its application on the iPhone mobile app.
“Orion Health has an internal team that focuses on the security of our platform, and the team engaged with Apple to receive direct guidance on ensuring that the mobile application is secure,” said Stevens.
The mobile app uses HTTPS and offers support for data encryption, remote wipe and data minimization on the Apple handset, said Stevens.
Another company, Diversinet, recently upgraded its mobile health security platform. Its Oct. 25 upgrade included remote data wipe and app wakeup. Diversinet also added the ability for doctors to send reminders of appointments and medication schedules without an active cellular or WiFi connection.