Carlsbad and Bakersfield, CA—Medsphere Systems Corporation and Kern Medical Center today announced that Kern has met the requirements for Stage One Meaningful Use with Medsphere’s OpenVista® system, the enabling electronic health record (EHR), and has received more than $5 million in initial reimbursement from the federal government.

Affiliated with both the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the UC Irvine School of Medicine, county-owned Kern Medical Center cares for more than 16,000 patients annually and includes affiliated clinics that cover more than 100,000 patients. The 222-bed central California teaching hospital ultimately expects to receive in excess of $11 million, covering the initial investment in OpenVista, from the federal government over the life of the Meaningful Use reimbursement program established by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

“Imagine that every county hospital in the United States chose the same responsible path as Kern Medical Center. Local taxpayers would enjoy better care and save millions compared to the cost of other EHR systems,” said Medsphere President and CEO Irv Lichtenwald. “And all county hospitals could be connected and sharing patient records and valuable best practices. Kern and CEO Paul Hensler deserve credit for leading the way among publicly supported hospitals, and Medsphere congratulates them on receiving federal funds.”

Above and beyond the dollars saved on an EHR with OpenVista, Kern also calculates that the hospital will save from $1 million to $1.5 million annually on the elimination of paper and other costs associated with traditional patient record keeping.

“Many have argued that the implementation of an EHR is an organizational project, not an IT project. I agree, which is why I am so proud of the clinicians and staff here at Kern, who determinedly did the heavy lifting necessary for federal reimbursement,” said Kern Medical Center CEO Paul Hensler, FACHE. “When I see the multimillions of dollars other hospitals are spending to receive a fraction of their overall costs, I know that Medsphere and OpenVista was the right choice for our patients and local taxpayers.”

Kern Medical Center joins other Medsphere hospital partners who have received federal stimulus funds. Midland Memorial Hospital recently received $3.3 million of more than $7 million expected over the life of the Meaningful Use program; Hoboken University Medical Center earlier received about $3 million of an estimated $8 million in total federal reimbursement.

According to statistics provided by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), slightly less than 14 percent of all U.S. hospitals have met Meaningful Use requirements and received stimulus funds. As one of a select group of hospitals that have received federal reimbursement, Kern Medical Center has demonstrated what a community hospital can accomplish with the right system, partners and commitment.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

Carlsbad, CA, and Midland, TX—Medsphere Systems Corporation and Midland Memorial Hospital today announced that Midland Memorial has met the requirements for Stage One Meaningful Use with Medsphere’s OpenVista system, the empowering electronic health record (EHR), and has received an initial reimbursement from the federal government. According to Midland Memorial administrators, the hospital has received initial disbursements of $2.3 million from the Medicare side of the program and $1 million in Medicaid compensation.

Having gone live in early 2006, well before the federal reimbursement program was established, Midland Memorial is Medsphere’s long-standing partner and a true pioneer in the adoption of open source EHRs derived from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ VistA system, the most widely used EHR in the world. The 320-bed West Texas hospital will ultimately receive in excess of $7 million, significantly more than the initial investment cost of OpenVista, from the federal government over the life of the Meaningful Use reimbursement program established by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

“When Midland Memorial embarked on their EHR journey, there was no federal Meaningful Use reimbursement program, clearly demonstrating both the foresight and commitment to quality of Midland hospital administrators,” said Medsphere President and CEO Irv Lichtenwald. “It is so gratifying to see our valued partner receive this financial reward for their extensive efforts to improve patient care and control costs.”

Since implementing OpenVista, Midland Memorial has significantly improved the quality of patient care, with 93 percent of physicians using OpenVista. It has also been recognized repeatedly as one of the nation’s best hospitals. In 2008 alone, the hospital was named a Thomson Top 100 Hospital and one of America’s Best Hospitals, and also received a CEO HIT Achievement Award from the Healthcare Information Management and Systems Society (HIMSS) and a Performance Award from U.S. News and World Report. Also in 2008 Midland Memorial was named one of the first 11 hospitals in the nation to receive HIMSS Analytics Stage 6 recognition for comprehensive health IT adoption.

“I simply can’t say enough about the flexibility and hard work of Midland Memorial clinicians and staff over the last few years. They embraced twenty-first century healthcare technology before there was a financial incentive to do so, which says a great deal about their level of commitment,” said Midland Memorial CEO Russell Meyers. “Medsphere and OpenVista gave us an economical path to a comprehensive EHR, and we look forward to working collaboratively to enhance the solution as we prepare for the next stages of Meaningful Use.”

Midland Memorial joins other Medsphere hospital partners who have received federal stimulus funds, including the previously announced Hoboken University Medical Center, which recently received an estimated $3 million of what is expected to be roughly $8 million in total federal reimbursement.

According to statistics provided at the end of September by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), slightly less than 10 percent of all U.S. hospitals have met Meaningful Use requirements and received stimulus funds. As one of a select group of hospitals that have received federal reimbursement, Midland Memorial has demonstrated what a community hospital can accomplish with the right system, partners and commitment.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

Carlsbad, CA—December 20, 2011—Medsphere Systems Corporation today congratulated Hoboken University Medical Center (HUMC) on meeting the requirements for Stage One of Meaningful Use and receiving an initial reimbursement from the federal government for the implementation of Medsphere’s OpenVista, the enabling electronic health record (EHR). According to HUMC’s technology consultant, the New Jersey hospital will receive an estimated $8 million overall in federal stimulus funds, $3 million of that this year.

HUMC has been live since the spring of 2011on OpenVista, Medsphere’s comprehensive open source system derived from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ VistA solution, the most widely used EHR in the world. The 328-bed hospital will ultimately receive significantly more than the total five-year cost of OpenVista from the federal government over the term of the Meaningful Use reimbursement program established by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA).

“What Hoboken has accomplished clinically and financially with OpenVista is significant and serves as a template for other hospitals. I am particularly proud of the collaborative spirit of Medsphere services and the HUMC staff and consultants working together to implement the system,” said Medsphere President and CEO Irv Lichtenwald. “OpenVista enables improved patient care, and the affordability of the solution combined with Medsphere’s subscription service model gives HUMC financial flexibility to deal with unforeseen health IT challenges in the future.”

For HUMC and other hospitals facing financial challenges, the affordability of OpenVista and Medsphere’s unique subscription-based business model put a comprehensive electronic health record within reach.

According to statistics provided at the end of September by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), slightly less than 10 percent of all U.S. hospitals have met Meaningful Use requirements and received stimulus funds. As one of a select group of hospitals that have received federal reimbursement, HUMC has demonstrated what a community hospital can accomplish with the right system, partners and commitment.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

Carlsbad, CA—November 29, 2011—Lutheran Medical Center President and CEO Wendy Goldstein highlighted the use of their open source EHR as a change agent for system-wide quality improvement at the recent Meaningful Use NOW executive conference held in Weehawken, NJ. Several area hospital executives and industry thought leaders illustrated the profound clinical and financial impact open source EHRs can have on hospitals, particularly those facilities that cannot afford significantly more expensive proprietary systems. 

In November 2010, Lutheran Medical Center went live with Medsphere’s OpenVista® electronic health record (EHR) derived from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs’ VistA solution, the most widely used EHR in the world. Lutheran is currently readying for Meaningful Use and plans to attest for federal government reimbursement in early 2012.

A 476-bed teaching hospital, Level 1 trauma center, stroke center and ambulatory clinic, Lutheran embraced the EHR implementation process with active participation from every department, clinical to administrative.

“The EHR you choose to achieve Meaningful Use needs to be a change agent for your organization,” said Goldstein in her presentation to Meaningful Use NOW attendees. “By going with OpenVista and open source, we’ve chosen affordability and retained crucial control, including financial, over that change agent. With access to the source code, we can make changes ourselves every time regulations require a new field instead of paying a vendor $10,000 and waiting four months.”

Added Medsphere President and CEO Irv Lichtenwald: “What Lutheran Medical Center has accomplished clinically and operationally is significant and serves as a template for other hospitals. OpenVista is the catalyst to evaluate workflow and business process. It enables improved patient care, and the affordability of the solution combined with Medsphere’s subscription service model gives the hospital financial flexibility to deal with unforeseen health IT challenges in the future.”

The facility-level cultural change Goldstein spoke of served as a case study for other Meaningful Use NOW presenters, who addressed the potential collective impact of such dynamics on the entire industry.
“We need better clinical integration to improve the quality of care. There needs to be a common IT platform, a strategy that is more cost effective and allows us to tie more markets together,” said Bill Petasnick, FACHE, CEO of Wisconsin’s Froedtert Health System, and former chair of the American Hospital Association Board of Trustees. “We need an IT strategy and, perhaps, an open architecture. It may be the only way to link these markets.”

Focused on hospitals in the New York City / New Jersey area, Meaningful Use NOW was the first in a series of planned regional events related to understanding the best practices required to achieve Meaningful Use quickly and affordably. Presenters, who returned repeatedly to an overarching theme of reigning in healthcare costs, included executives from both the broader health IT industry and area hospitals that have implemented an EHR and worked through the attestation process.

“We cannot afford what we are offering in healthcare today. The question is how will we double the patients, cut price in half and improve quality,” asked Mark Blatt, MD, worldwide medical director for sales and marketing at Intel. “The VA needed to care for twice the amount of people with half the budget. What did they do? They looked to IT.”

As the architect of the VA’s transformation, former Under Secretary for Health and current Medsphere Chairman Kenneth W. Kizer, MD, MPH, made clear that, for a number of reasons, healthcare costs will continue to increase in coming years  and health IT will be foundational to managing these rising costs with the all but certain reduced reimbursement that is also coming.

“It is reasonable to expect at least a 20 to 25 percent increase in the demand for healthcare services by 2019, at the same time that we are facing widespread and worsening healthcare worker shortages,” Kizer said.

Kizer, currently Director of the Institute for Population Health Improvement, University of California Davis Health System, in Sacramento, went on to say that, “The EHR will be an essential aid for navigating the turbulent waters of healthcare reform that lie ahead. In many ways, it is like the stethoscope at the end of the nineteenth century. EHRs are a basic healthcare tool that enables us to practice medicine in a different way. And open source EHRs are the health IT game changer.”

Meaningful Use Now was sponsored by Medsphere Systems Corporation, Intel and Panasonic Solutions Company. Medsphere will organize future Meaningful Use NOW events in other regions around the United States.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

Carlsbad, Calif.—Medsphere Systems Corporation, the leading provider of open-source healthcare enterprise solutions, today announced the addition of John Bright to the company’s leadership team as vice president of sales and marketing. Bright comes to Medsphere with more than 20 years of increasingly responsible sales leadership experience, the last 10 of which were spent in healthcare information technology. He brings a portfolio of established relationships and proven sales methodologies to leverage for Medsphere.

Most recently, Bright led the Henry Schein Medical Systems sales team to 80 percent growth in direct sales over an 18 month period and developed a comprehensive sales training program for both legacy and new sales personnel. Previously, he worked as vice president of sales and marketing for Health Research Sciences, LLC, a maker of medical devices for the early detection of retinal disease and macular degeneration.

Demonstrating his entrepreneurial spirit, in 2001 Bright founded BrightCAM Solutions, a creator of computer aided design (CAD) / computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software. In 2003, he co-founded and became CEO of Mountain Medical Technologies, a developer of electronic medical record and practice management software for the ambulatory market.

“From our initial meeting, I could tell that John is absolutely focused on process leading to success. He has proven techniques that get results, but also has the awareness to shift direction if change is necessary,” said Medsphere President and CEO Irv Lichtenwald. “I know that John will prove to be an effective mentor for our entire sales organization and will rapidly identify those hospitals that are best suited for Medsphere and OpenVista.”

For Bright, Medsphere represents an opportunity to apply his time-tested methodologies to the most vibrant corner of healthcare IT.

“It’s widely known that healthcare IT and electronic health records (EHRs) in particular are high growth areas given the benefits they provide our nation’s healthcare. I’m very excited to help expand Medsphere’s established client base and promote both the OpenVista solution and open source development,” Bright explained. “The history of health IT suggests movement toward greater openness instead of silos of information. The industry is progressing toward interoperability and flexibility, and I’m thrilled to be with a company that is leading the way.” 

A graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, Bright has three children and lives with his wife in the Bay Area.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

SAN DIEGO – Medsphere Systems Corporation, a pioneer in open-source healthcare enterprise solutions, today announced the generally available (GA) release of the enhanced OpenVista® electronic health record (EHR) platform, which is currently being installed across the Medsphere client base.

New OpenVista features enable doctors, nurses, technicians and other medical professionals to create their own views, dashboards and workflows enabling quick access to specific information needed to provide the best possible patient care.

“The improvements we’ve made enable clinicians using OpenVista to increase efficiency and improve clinical outcomes, which provides obvious benefit to both doctor and patient,” says Irv H. Lichtenwald, Medsphere president and CEO. “In addition, the upgraded OpenVista enables hospitals to achieve Meaningful Use and qualify for federal incentives. In fact, a hospital can pay for OpenVista with stimulus funds alone, making it the most financially cost effective of all certified EHRs.”

Among the hospitals receiving the upgrade is Midland Memorial, a 320-bed, HIMMS Analytics Stage 6 healthcare system in west Texas. Since implementing the OpenVista system and achieving near-paperless status, Midland has even greater access to patient information, which has enabled clinicians and staff to achieve improved clinical outcomes:

• Fewer patient deaths
• An 88 percent reduction in infection rates
• Fewer hospital-acquired pressure ulcers (bed sores)
• A 77 percent increase in compliance with ventilator care support that can lead to reduced hospital-acquired pneumonia
• Reduction in sepsis related to central venous access that can lead to reduced length of stay and death

“Because the OpenVista system costs about one-third the price of a typical proprietary platform, our decision was pretty easy from the start,” said David Whiles, director of information systems at Midland Memorial Hospital. “What really sold us, though, were two things: First, the system is very functionally rich and truly integrated. Second, and even more important, is that Medsphere is responsive to our needs and genuinely invested in our clinical success. We acquired an EHR system and it came with a team ready to provide the services necessary to make it work. This model can benefit all hospitals that don’t have tremendous resources."

Medsphere’s 9 – 12 month implementation process and other services facilitate fluid and rapid transition to a paperless clinical environment focusing on best practices and evidence-based medicine. The rapid implementation process enables hospitals to qualify for ARRA stimulus funds in the shortest possible timeframe. Additionally, the company actively nurtures a Healthcare Open Source Ecosystem of clients, partners, developers and other online collaborators who drive OpenVista innovation and provide a financially efficient parallel development and support structure.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

The official ACET announcement of the award follows.

ACET, Inc. wins second straight multi-billion dollar ID/IQ contract within a year!

Adams Communication & Engineering Technology (ACET), Inc. has won its 2nd straight multi-billion dollar contract within a year. The first, awarded in July 2010, is the Rapid Response Third Generation (R2-3G), a $16.4B IDIQ contract with the Army’s Communications and Electronics Command. Following that milestone, the Department of Veteran Affairs, Office of Information and Technology awarded ACET's Medical Systems Division a multiple award contract vehicle to provide comprehensive, world-wide IT support services and solutions to support both VA and non-VA customers. The Transformation Twenty-One Total Technology (T4) contract is the largest IT procurement in VA history. The five-year, $12 billion program ceiling is designed to meet a wide range of the VA IT modernization goals. This is an indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) multiple-award task order (MATO) contract. Individual task orders shall be issued on a time-and-materials/labor hour, cost reimbursement, and/or firm-fixed-price (FFP) basis. “T4 is a major tool in the transformation of VA into a 21st Century organization,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki in a statement. “These contracts will enable VA to acquire services for information technology programs that will help ensure timely delivery of health care and benefits to our Veterans.”

This multibillion-dollar contract provides the VA a vehicle to address information technology needs – services, solutions, hardware and software for requirements that span the enterprise and fundamentally transform the organization. Claudine Adams, COO added, “ACET’s Medical Systems Division will provide an impressive range of IT services and operations for the VA”. The services include program management, strategy, enterprise architecture and planning support; systems and software engineering; software demonstration and deployment; test and evaluation; enterprise network services; IT management; cyber-security; operation and maintenance, and IT facilities. Charles Adams, ACET’s CEO stated “Winning large and strategically important contracts is at the core of our corporate goals, We are extremely proud to be in a select group of small businesses that have been awarded more than one multi-billion dollar ID/IQ contract and to receive a T4 award. We are even more honored to serve US military veterans and their families.”

VA's Plans for IT Solutions

The VA FY 2012 Budget request for the Office of Information and Technology (OI&T) is $3.1 billion. This figure includes funding to support information and technology at $457 million, maintaining the systems at $1.4 billion, to bring new products on line at $198 million, and for staffing and administration at $915 million. The VA IT infrastructure serves nearly 290,000 employees, 100,000 trainees, and over 23.4 million veterans and families. The VA IT budget for OI&T’s development activities will be carried out within a framework provided by 16 Major Transformational Initiatives. The 16 Transformational Initiatives included in the FY 2012 OI&T budget request are:

• Eliminate veteran homelessness
• Veterans benefits management system
• Automate GI Bill benefits
• Virtual Lifetime Electronic Record
• Improve veterans mental health
• Build veterans relationship management to enable convenient, seamless interactions
• New models of health care
• Enhance the veteran’s access to healthcare
• Ensure preparedness to meet emergent national needs
• Enable systems to drive performance and outcomes
• Establish strong VA management infrastructure and integrated operating model
• Transform human capital management via HCIP
• Perform R&D to enhance long term health and well being
• Optimize the utilization of the VA’s Capital Portfolio
• Improve healthcare efficiency and create organizational value
• Transform healthcare delivery through health informatics

For more details on the FY 2012 budget request pertaining to medical programs and IT, go to www.va.gov/budget/products.asp then click on Volume II Medical Programs and Information Technology.

ACET, Inc. is a Veteran Owned Small Business (VOSB) system engineering and information technology (IT) firm, headquartered in Southern Maryland. Incorporated in 1999, the company supports mission critical IT business needs for large and complex clients within the Federal sector, including the intelligence community (IC), Department of Defense (DOD), and Veterans Affairs, as well as select commercial clients. The company’s core services include System Engineering and Business Solutions, Enterprise Technical Solutions, Software Solutions, Emerging Technology, and Intelligence Collections and Analysis. ACET, Inc.’s technical, programmatic, and analytical professionals are experts in commercial technology, customized solutions, and proprietary government systems.

Click here to read the original release and learn more about ACET.

Phoenix, AZ, and Carlsbad, CA—June 2, 2011—Medsphere Systems Corporation, the leading provider of open-source healthcare enterprise solutions, today announced that the company has won a competitive bidding process to work with the Indian Health Service (IHS) on the agency’s Resource and Patient Management System (RPMS), derived from the  Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) VistA electronic health record (EHR).

Initially valued at more than $15 million over five years, the contract is focused on two primary objectives for the RPMS solution:

• Provide support, training and development, including interfaces, for VueCentric®, a graphical user interface (GUI) framework used in healthcare facilities nationwide serving American Indian and Alaska Native populations. VueCentric enhances RPMS usability by enabling a modular approach to configuring disparate application views for a single user or group of users.
• Develop a Web-enabled clinical user interface enabling simplified implementation and support, improving clinical adoption for smaller IHS facilities.

“With this new contract, Medsphere and the IHS continue a six-year development relationship,” said Medsphere President and CEO Mike Doyle. “The selection of Medsphere validates both the quality of the work we’ve done for the IHS to date and the strong clinical, patient and operational benefits of their EHR system. We’re very pleased to contribute to the IHS and be a key partner enabling them to deliver quality healthcare to American Indian and Alaska Native populations.”

Medsphere also provides development, support and training for OpenVista®, a comprehensive clinical support tool derived from VistA for non-federal hospitals. Recent studies show VistA has yielded $3.09 billion in benefits to the VA primarily from the near elimination of medication administration issues and duplicate testing.

OpenVista is proven to enhance medical care and remove the cost barrier to EHR implementation that hospitals typically encounter when considering proprietary, closed-source products. Medsphere’s subscription-based and transparent pricing model for implementation, maintenance and support services make effective health IT resources financially possible for every hospital, clinic and integrated care system in the United States.

About the Indian Health Service

The Indian Health Service (IHS), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, is responsible for providing federal health services to American Indians and Alaska Natives. The provision of health services to members of federally-recognized tribes grew out of the special government-to-government relationship between the federal government and Indian tribes. This relationship, established in 1787, is based on Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution, and has been given form and substance by numerous treaties, laws, Supreme Court decisions, and Executive Orders. The agency is the principal federal healthcare provider and health advocate for Indian people and its goal is to raise their health status to the highest possible level. IHS currently provides health services to approximately 1.5 million American Indians and Alaska Natives who belong to more than 557 federally recognized tribes in 35 states.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

Carlsbad, Calif.—May 17, 2011—Medsphere Systems Corporation, the leading provider of open-source healthcare enterprise solutions, today announced complete electronic health record (EHR) certification in inpatient settings for the company’s OpenVista electronic health record. Certification by InfoGard confirms that Medsphere customers using OpenVista are enabled to meet “meaningful use” standards and maximize federal assistance.

“The significance for Medsphere customers of OpenVista certification is clear but can’t be overstated. Our customers can be certain that the solution they chose will get them to meaningful use and federal funding,” said Medsphere President and CEO Mike Doyle. “More broadly, InfoGard certification of OpenVista also demonstrates that there are many more ways to meaningful use than through expensive, confining proprietary vendors. Open source can get you to meaningful use quickly, affordably, reliably and without the unnecessary baggage that proprietary systems bring.”

Of course, hospitals can’t meet federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding requirements if clinicians won’t use the system. Brooklyn’s Lutheran Medical Center has reached 93 percent physician adoption of OpenVista for computerized provider order entry. Similarly, Silver Hill Hospital, a nationally recognized psychiatric facility in New Canaan, Conn, has achieved 98 percent physician adoption of CPOE.

Midland Memorial Hospital, a HIMSS Analytics Stage 6 facility, effectively and rapidly moved the majority of physicians to electronic ordering within 90 days of their go live event in 2006.

“The adoptability and intuitive nature of the system is one of the reasons we were comfortable moving forward with OpenVista in the first place,” explained David Whiles, director of information systems at Midland Memorial. “The affordability is very important, of course, but it wouldn’t matter if the system didn’t provide closed-loop medication management and other attributes that improve clinical workflow and patient care.”

For hospitals that have not yet implemented an EHR, the certification of OpenVista is equally significant. Now that federal payments have begun, OpenVista is the certified solution that is adoptable, highly affordable, proven and can be implemented quickly enough to still maximize federal stimulus payments as soon as possible. 

InfoGard also gave modular EHR certification in ambulatory environments to OpenVista. Medsphere is developing OpenVista for full EHR certification in ambulatory settings and is working closely with integrated health networks among current customers to enhance the system in clinically efficient and effective ways.

Visit the Office of the National Coordinator’s Certified Health IT Product List page for the specific certification criteria OpenVista had to meet.

InfoGard Disclaimer

Medsphere’s OpenVista electronic health record, version 1.5, received complete EHR certification for inpatient settings (certificate number IG-2449-11-0062) and modular certification for ambulatory settings (certificate number IG-2449-11-0063)  from InfoGard on May 4, 2011. Click here to access the specific clinical quality measures for which OpenVista has been certified.

This EHR Module is 2011/2012 compliant and has been certified by an ONC-ATCB in accordance with the applicable certification criteria adopted by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. This certification does not represent an endorsement by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services or guarantee the receipt of incentive payments.

About InfoGard

Founded in 1993 with a mission to provide accredited IT security assurance services to customers worldwide, InfoGard is the first private IT security laboratory to become accredited by the United States National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Payment Card Industry (PCI) Security Council, and Postal authorities.

Over the years the company has expanded their security services by investing in multiple formal accreditation programs. Genuine independence enables the organization to remain objective and serve customers free from any potential conflicts of interest. Through accredited formal security evaluation programs and specialty IT services, InfoGard serves over 200 customers in more than 25 countries.

InfoGard staff includes experts in cryptography, computer engineering, software security, systems architecture, physical security, site security, project management and security assurance specialists.

Click here to visit the InfoGard Web site.

About Medsphere and OpenVista

San Diego, Calif.—Medsphere Systems Corporation, the leading provider of open-source healthcare enterprise solutions, today announced the addition of Richard B. “Rick” Toren to the company’s board of directors. Over a career spanning more than 30 years, Rick has consistently met health and healthcare challenges with a blend of technological creativity and sound business acumen.

Rick’s experience and perspective are uncommonly broad. He has built and run companies and corporate divisions, and he has also succeeded in the tedious detail work of health and healthcare product development.

“Rick Toren’s resume illustrates quite clearly why Medsphere is honored to welcome him to the board,” said Medsphere President and CEO Mike Doyle. “On both strategic and tactical levels, his skill set is matched by few individuals in the health IT industry. We’re confident his contributions to the board will be effective and enduring.”

In Medsphere, Rick saw an opportunity to contribute to a project that combines two of his primary values.

“Anyone who knows me knows that I get involved with projects that make a positive social impact and have a strong likelihood of success,” Toren said. “I see in Medsphere the opportunity to serve hospitals of all shapes, sizes and specialties. Medsphere and OpenVista’s unique pricing model allows hospitals to deploy an outstanding and proven EHR regardless of financial strength.”

Rick currently serves as chairman and president of CodeRyte, Inc., a technology firm that automates billing code extraction.

Click on Rick Toren to access his full bio.