Press Releases
Tufts-New England Medical Center Selects RelayHealth Service to Connect Doctors, Patients Online
Joins Growing List of Healthcare Leaders Licensing Secure, Interoperable, Reimbursed Online Communication Service
Boston, MA, and Emeryville, CA, June 1, 2005 — RelayHealth Corporation, the nation's premier provider of health plan-reimbursed online doctor-patient communication services, and Tufts-New England Medical Center today announced that Tufts-New England Medical Center Division of General Internal Medicine will license RelayHealth services to securely connect physicians and their established patients online.
Boston-based Tufts-New England Medical Center (Tufts-NEMC), the principal teaching hospital for Tufts University School of Medicine, is one of the country's leading medical institutions.
Starting in June, practitioners in the Division of General Internal Medicine at Tufts-NEMC will be the first of the organization's providers to utilize the secure RelayHealth service to help patients resolve non-urgent health matters online-using the webVisit® consultation service, the eScript prescribing and renewal service, and other timesaving features.
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts will reimburse Tufts-NEMC physicians for qualifying webVisits conducted with its members, as part of an ongoing program announced in 2003. The Boston-based health plan provides coverage to 2.7 million members.
"With more than two centuries of innovation in healthcare, Tufts-NEMC sees RelayHealth as a tremendous opportunity to perpetuate our pioneering tradition," said David Fairchild, M.D., Chief, Division of General Internal Medicine for Tufts-NEMC. "Through RelayHealth, we intend to provide a unique suite of services that will both increase the efficiency with which patient communications are managed, and provide patients with an outstanding level of service."
Through formal academic research, Tufts-NEMC plans to assess the impact of RelayHealth on patient and physician satisfaction, as well as the efficiency and increased quality of healthcare delivery. Recent published research reports that user-physician practices experienced an 18 percent drop in telephone call volume and user-physicians averaged 11 percent more visits per day than colleagues not using the service. (Liederman EM, Lee JC, Baquero VH, et al. Patient-Physician Web Messaging: The Impact of Message Volume and Satisfaction. J Gen Internal Medicine 2005; 20(1)).
The agreement with Tufts-NEMC follows similar agreements with dozens of the nation's preeminent medical groups, affiliated with leading clinical and medical research centers such as Columbia University Medical Center, Weill Cornell Physician Organization, Stanford University and UCLA.
"We look forward to serving the doctors, staff and patients of Tufts-NEMC," said Giovanni Colella, MD, president and chief executive officer of RelayHealth. "Tufts-NEMC is a key player in the Massachusetts healthcare market - one of a growing number of markets in which RelayHealth is becoming a standard for secure, interoperable online communication services."
About Tufts-New England Medical Center
Tufts-New England Medical Center is a world-class, academic medical institution in Boston,
and is home to two full-service hospitals, one serving adults and The Floating Hospital for
Children dedicated exclusively to all levels of pediatric care. The Medical Center is also
the principal teaching hospital for Tufts University School of Medicine, and pioneers groundbreaking
research including numerous clinical trials available exclusively at Tufts-NEMC. For more
information, visit www.tufts-nemc.org
About RelayHealth Corporation
RelayHealth is the premier provider of secure online healthcare communication services linking
patients, healthcare professionals, payors, and pharmacies. RelayHealth's Web-based, doctor-patient
messaging platform connects doctors and their patients efficiently, affordably, and securely.
Tuned for both small and large practice environments, the RelayHealth® service
improves and streamlines healthcare delivery and access through modular features — like
the webVisit® clinical consultation — which tackle
complex issues unique to the healthcare market, including clinical structure, practice workflow,
and reimbursement. More secure and efficient than telephone or e-mail, RelayHealth combines
HIPAA-ready messaging and eScript end-to-end electronic prescribing
for the most seamless, comprehensive, and powerful messaging platform available to healthcare
professionals and their patients. For information, visit www.relayhealth.com.
