A Medical Device Daily

Ascent Healthcare Solutions (Phoenix) reported that MedAssets Supply Chain Systems (Alpharetta, Georgia) has chosen it to provide reprocessing and remanufacturing services of single-use medical devices (SUDs) to its customers.

Ascent will participate in MedAssets' Next Generation SELECT program, designed to lower supply cost savings up to 18% on average for MedAssets' customers through a multi-year program covering the key supply categories used in patient care. Ascent said its environmentally responsible products would also be promoted through MedAssets' Environmentally Preferable Purchasing program.

"Ascent's outstanding performance and proven track record has earned MedAssets Supply Chain Systems' Gold Vendor status at the 2008 MedAssets Healthcare Business Summit, which recognizes outstanding vendors based on their ability to improve customer savings and satisfaction," said John Julian, executive director of materials management at MedAssets."It makes good financial and environmental sense for our customers to use Ascent's reprocessed and remanufactured devices."

Through MedAssets' Next Generation SELECT program, its customers will be able to reprocess about 90 medical device types for which Ascent has FDA clearance. These include cardiovascular, endoscopic/laparoscopic, general surgery/OR, orthopedic/arthroscopic, gastroenterology, respiratory, and ophthalmology devices.

In other agreements/contracts:

• Unibased Systems Architecture (USA; Chesterfield, Missouri) and iMDsoft (Needham, Massachusetts), a provider of clinical information systems for acute care, have entered into a marketing and sales collaboration intended to provide the most comprehensive perioperative information system available to hospitals in North America.

"We are very excited about this collaborative relationship," said Larry Covington, president/CEO of USA."Both companies have been searching for the right partner to incorporate anesthesia, surgical, and nursing documentation, thereby establishing a comprehensive clinical record as a feeder to the longitudinal hospital systems."

He added,"The integration of access management and all resource scheduling delivered in our ForSite2020 application suite, which includes a very strong surgery management system (ORMS), will expand market opportunities for both organizations. ORMS provides a single-pass solution for conflict-free scheduling, charge capture and monitoring, and remote access for the surgeon's office to perform their scheduling via the web. Analytic reporting is provided in standard, routine reporting, or can be created with other tools such as EasyQ and ForSite Analytics."

According to Covington, USA's strength as a system integrator provides rapid and complete integration with legacy, documentation, and clinical information systems. Working with iMDsoft will integrate two best-of-breed systems to provide a surgical management and comprehensive perioperative solution, he said.

Phyllis Gotlib, CEO of iMDsoft, said the relationship"further strengthens our mutual market position in North America by aligning our advanced technologies with a highly respected surgical and enterprise scheduling partner."

• Amerinet (St. Louis), a national healthcare group purchasing organization, reported a new five-year, sole-source purchasing agreement with the Kentucky Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics (Frankfurt, Kentucky).

The agreement offers the more than 750 chapter members access to Amerinet's full suite of tools and services focused on improving efficiency and reducing cost through contracting and utilization strategies and enhancing economic value through operational improvement.

In addition to offering chapter members total supply spend management services and tools, including cost reduction, contract evaluation and implementation, they will also have access to education tools through Inquisit, Amerinet's education division and Amerinet's team of industry experts for speaking and conference opportunities.