ERIE COUNTY MEDICAL CENTER' S CONTINUING CARE SYSTEM TO TAKE QUALITY OF CARE TO NEW LEVELS WITH VOICE-ASSISTED CARE

Accuracy improvements will help prepare organization to maximize reimbursements as NY state converts to RUG III

PITTSBURGH, AUGUST 4, 2008 - Vocollect Healthcare Systems, Inc. announces that Erie County Home, located in Alden, New York, will deploy AccuNurse® voice-assisted care throughout their 586-bed facility. The Erie County Home part of the Erie County Medical Center’s Continuing Care System expects the investment in voice-assisted care to take quality of care to new levels by enabling more proactive care and providing more time for direct resident care.

By giving caregivers the capability to access resident care needs on-demand, complete paperwork simply by talking, enhance care-team collaboration with the Silent Page™ capability and respond faster to resident needs with nurse call integration, Erie County Home expects to achieve numerous performance and reimbursement gains throughout its facility, including enabling higher levels of staff efficiency while increasing quality, eliminating paperwork, and achieving compliance.

According to Richard C. Cleland NHA, MPA, executive director of Erie County Medical Center’s Continuing Care System, “We evaluated all point-of-care systems for our facility and quickly identified voice-assisted care as the best solution. The premier focus for our organization is providing the highest quality care; along with increasing the efficiency of our staff. With AccuNurse voice-assisted care, we expect an increase in accuracy of our documentation, better preparation for the RUG III system coming to New York this year, and ultimately, maximized reimbursements. On the human resource side, we’ll also use our investment in AccuNurse as a key recruitment and retention tool for our organization. Voice-assisted care makes our workday more productive, and ultimately, provides our team with access to the most leading-edge care solutions available on the market today.”

AccuNurse voice-assisted care will enable the following processes: real-time access to information and other staff; the elimination of paper-based printouts for managing care needs and documentation; the ability for caregivers to make decisions more accurately and quickly; and, the ability for the care team to multi-task while documenting care, thereby improving efficiencies and reducing overtime.

“Our goal is to completely replace our paper-driven, manual care and reporting processes and become fully automated with voice-assisted care,” said Cleland. “Currently, we are spending 30 minutes at the end of every shift to document our care initiatives. That additional time will be eliminated with voice, enabling us to direct it back to our residents. Continuous charting throughout a shift will also enable us to take accuracy to new levels. We expect to be well-positioned to align our documentation processes with RUG III when it hits later this year, helping us secure our organization financially. This all equates to a better place for our residents to live and a better place for our caregivers to work.”

According to James Quasey, president of Vocollect Healthcare Systems, “Voice-assisted care will enable better collaboration between care staff, as well as enabling the direct care team to multitask, which means they have more time to focus on resident care. This provides a proven and affordable way for Erie County Home and Erie County Medical Center’s Continuing Care System to improve quality of care and give their care team a more efficient workday.”

About Vocollect Healthcare Systems
AccuNurse voice-assisted care from Vocollect Healthcare Systems, Inc. makes it easy for healthcare professionals to retrieve care needs on-demand, chart activities as they are completed, and Silent Page each other for help. Organizations using AccuNurse benefit from lower operating costs, maximized reimbursements, and improved quality of care. Vocollect Healthcare Systems is a subsidiary of Vocollect, Inc., the global leader in voice technology and delivering performance improvements in productivity, accuracy, cost reduction and worker satisfaction for mobile employees on six continents.

Vocollect® is a registered trademark of Vocollect, Inc.; AccuNurse® is a registered trademark of Vocollect Healthcare Systems.

Erie County Medical Center’s Continuing Care System includes skilled nursing facilities in Alden, New York, and Buffalo New York.