Siemens Healthcare has won an €18m deal to provide 37 hospitals and 300 clinics in South Africa with its Soarian MedSuite healthcare IT software.
Siemens says that over the next three years it will install the systems on behalf of Gauteng Department of Health. The project is the first of its kind for Siemens Healthcare in South Africa.
The Gauteng DoH awarded the contract to BAOKI consortium, which includes AMEtHST (a local joint venture formed by two of Siemens’ leading value-added resellers) and Equiton Investment Corporation, to implement the Siemens Soarian system province-wide. Siemens will act as a sub-contractor to provide the IT software component.
The implementation of Soarian MedSuite forms a key part of the Gauteng DoH’s overall objective to create a single electronic health record for patients across the province and to eliminate paper-based workflow.
Siemens says that Soarian MedSuite, is an integrated hospital information system which manages the clinical, financial and administrative process from beginning to end. Soarian is said the enable hospitals and clinics to increase efficiency, productivity and quality of care across the healthcare enterprise.
“A primary benefit of the Siemens hospital information system is that once a patient’s details have been captured and stored, they can be shared across the hospital’s departments as well as with other hospitals and clinics in the region,” said Graham Maritz, CEO of Siemens Healthcare in South Africa. “
Maritz added: “Once in place within the hospital network, Soarian MedSuite will help optimize processes such as registration, admissions, discharge, billing, medical records management and enterprise-wide multi-resource scheduling.”
The 704-bed Sebokeng Hospital, has acted as the pilot site for the software, which was implemented over months from August 2008.
In addition to the hospital information system, Siemens Healthcare will provide a radiology information system to some hospitals covered by Gauteng DoH. The radiology departments concerned will be able to use the system to manage patient visits, schedule and track diagnostic procedures, store diagnoses and results, and send billable items to billing systems.
Link