A Medical Device Daily

The Baxter International Foundation (Deerfield, Illinois), the philanthropic arm of Baxter International, announced its first-quarter grant awards, totaling more than $1.3 million. In April, the foundation awarded grants to 20 organizations in six countries to support initiatives that improve global access to quality and cost-effective healthcare.

Nine of the 20 first-quarter awards focus on improving access to healthcare for women and children in disadvantaged and underserved communities throughout the world where Baxter employees live and work.

“There are women and children throughout the world without access to the healthcare and support services they desperately need,” said Jim Utts, president of the foundation. “The organizations funded through the foundation’s first-quarter grants are committed to providing this population with services that will make an immediate and sustainable impact on these communities.”

The foundation partnered with the Instituto Mexicano de Investigacion de Familia y Poblacion (IMIFAP) to improve the health of low-income women in Monterrey, Mexico. Since its founding in 1985, IMIFAP has become a leader in health prevention and reproductive health education for women and youth throughout Latin America. The $44,669 grant will allow IMIFAP to expand services in Monterrey to include intensive workshops on breast and cervical cancer prevention, reproductive health and family planning, and personal hygiene. IMIFAP plans to bring similar health improvement workshops to seven additional states in Mexico.

The foundation also partnered with Project Concern International, a non-governmental, non-profit organization that has promoted community health and integrated development throughout the world for more than 43 years. The $107,684 grant will support the deployment of two mobile health vans in the Nagapattinam District in India to improve access to healthcare for tsunami survivors. The mobile health vans will be integrated into the organization’s broader strategy to transition its tsunami aid activities from emergency disaster relief to long-term recovery, including the improvement of the health status of families, especially women and children, in some of the hardest-hit villages in the district.

dj Orthopedics (San Diego), a global medical device company specializing in rehabilitation and regeneration products for the non-operative orthopedic and spine markets, entered a sponsorship agreement with the Justin Sportsmedicine Team, the official medical provider to the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association.

As part of the agreement, dj Orthopedics will provide the Justin Sportsmedicine Team, and the more than 7,000 athletes they represent who compete in 12 rodeo circuits nationwide, with the complete line of DonJoy rigid and soft bracing products.

The Piedmont Health Alliance (Anderson, South Carolina) has selected Claims Manager from Plexis (Ashland, Oregon) for its claim-processing and benefit-administration system. The Piedmont Health Alliance is a physician hospital organization (PHO) associated with a 250- physician independent practice association (IPA). Piedmont will replace its existing RIMS system with Plexis Claims Manager, which employs flexible rules-based processing to meet the demands of the changing healthcare market.

The Piedmont Health Alliance performs PPO repricing, group administration for the organization’s employees and their dependents, and management services for the IPA.

Maxine Ramsey, executive director of Piedmont Health Alliance, said, “We needed a system with more flexibility in order to fully utilize electronic capabilities. After investigating several systems, we chose Plexis because we felt the rules-based system satisfied our need, and Plexis was willing to work with us to meet some of our special needs as well.”