A Medical Device Daily

The Johns Hopkins Hospital and Health System (Baltimore) has selected the 3M (St. Paul, Minnesota) 360 Encompass System to integrate and automate coding, clinical documentation improvement, and performance monitoring in a single workflow. The technology from 3M Health Information Systems will help the organization capture complete documentation, improve coding accuracy, speed time to billing, and report outcomes data that truly reflects the care provided.

The 3M 360 Encompass System addresses the inefficiencies of multiple coding and documentation processes and the added costs of unconnected systems, offering a breakthrough answer to the challenges of healthcare reform and ICD-10. The 3M solution promotes complete capture of patient severity in physician documentation to improve case mix and significantly reduces the time and resources needed to prepare physicians for ICD-10.

With the 3M Coding and Reimbursement System as its foundation, the 3M 360 Encompass System uses complete ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS coding content. The application natively codes in ICD-10 and enables coding in ICD-9 while viewing the ICD-10 equivalent. 3M is an international leader in coding and patient classification systems with more than 5,000 hospitals worldwide using 3M coding solutions to code and group patient data for decision support, quality measurement, and reimbursement.

3M Health Information Systems delivers software and consulting services.

In other agreements/contracts news:

• Covenant Security Services (Philadelphia) and W.L. Gore & Associates (Flagstaff, Arizona) extended its security partnership to Gore's Arizona facilities.

Covenant, which has been providing security services to W.L. Gore's Eastern Cluster for more than six years, will now be the fluoropolymer manufacturer's preferred national security provider. Best known for its Gore-Tex fabrics, W.L. Gore also makes technological, medical, pharmaceutical, and consumer products.

“Covenant is not just a vendor, or provider to Gore, they are truly a partner,“ said Ken Ford, W.L. Gore's Global Security Leader. “Our partnership with Covenant goes back to 2006, and since that time, Covenant has continued to raise the bar on quality, training and service. The success is a true reflection on the Covenant team's efforts to understand and deliver service that is aligned with our environment and culture.“

Covenant Security Services is a security services firm that partners with Fortune 500 companies.

• MD Buyline (Dallas) has agreed to a national, three-year contract with Novation (also Dallas), a healthcare supply chain expertise and contracting company. Terms of the contract state that Novation will make MD Buyline's services available to the network of 65,000+ members it serves through December 2015.

The MD Buyline suite of offerings helps ensure that hospitals and health systems optimize the clinical and financial impact of their medical technology decisions. “Our members recognize us as an objective third party that they can trust for evidence-based information, research, and strategic support to help them optimize their investments,“ said Satin Mirchandani, CEO of MD Buyline. “We are proud to be in business with Novation, and we look forward to providing the members Novation serves with the clinical, financial, and operational information needed to align their medical technology strategies with the realities of the new healthcare economy.“

• Radisphere (Cleveland) has partnered with the National Rural Health Association (NRHA; Washington) to bring high quality, lower cost radiology services to the rural hospital community.

Radisphere's Gold Partnership demonstrates what it calls its commitment to bringing a proven and tailored solution for hospitals under 100 beds. Radisphere offers a network of subspecialty radiologists who perform final reports and consults for small hospitals.

NRHA is a nonprofit organization working to improve the health and well-being of rural Americans and providing leadership on rural health issues through advocacy, communications, education and research.

Radisphere's delivery model combines local radiologists who provide hands-on patient care, the largest network of subspecialty radiologists, and a cloud-based technology platform.

• CivaTech Oncology (Research Triangle Park, North Carolina) was awarded a $1 million phase II contract from the National Institutes of Health (Bethesda, Maryland) and the National Cancer Institute (Atlanta) to further develop CivaSheet, a bioabsorbable uni-directional device for treatment of non-small-cell lung cancer. This contract's objective is to meet regulatory requirements that will enable the CivaSheet to be introduced into clinical practice.

CivaTech makes low dose rate brachytherapy devices. The company's first device, the CivaString, has been cleared by the FDA for use in localized tumors. The company is also developing implantable bioabsorbable brachytherapy products for the specialized treatment of breast and other localized cancers.