Big Information Technology Bet of a Small Community Hospital

Abstract

Broadlawns Medical Center (BMC) is a teaching acute care community hospital of 200 beds located in Des Moines, Iowa. As other safety net providers across the nation, the hospital operates in a difficult environment with a growing number of uninsured patients and simultaneously dwindling tax support. By 2005, George Washington University and several Joint Commission reports had publicly highlighted the hospital’s challenges of financial sustainability and the provided quality of care. The hospital’s senior management team decided to adopt an Electronic Health Record (EHR) system in an attempt to gain access to real-time performance data. The EHR adoption project posed many organizational, managerial, and technological challenges but also provided numerous eventual benefits. BMC had not only successfully resolved the stated problems of healthcare quality, financial stability, and patient satisfaction scores, but also became one of the national leaders in healthcare information technology.