Salesforce gets large purchase agreement from HHS

Health Data Management’s weekly roundup of new health IT contracts and deployments include deals for Salesforce, eClinicalWorks, and Allscripts.

• Salesforce has a new $100 million blanket purchase agreement with the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, enabling HHS staff and divisions to buy Salesforce licenses through a central purchasing vehicle. HHS expects economies of scale from an agency-wide purchase will make the software more accessible and cost-efficient.

Ambulatory software vendor eClinicalWorks, which recently announced a new initiative to target sales to urgent care centers, has its first such client. CityMD, a chain of urgent care centers serving the greater New York City market with 52 locations, has gone live on the vendor’s practice management, electronic health records and patient portal software to enhance patient engagement and care coordination. CityMD served more than one million patients in 2015.

Cleveland-based University Hospitals uses Allscripts’ Sunrise Clinical Manager EHR in nine hospitals and now will add additional modules that include surgical, anesthesia, radiology, interoperability, data aggregation and mobile applications. Further, University Hospitals will implement the complete suite of software in five hospitals acquired in recent years. Allscripts also has a new contract in England, as Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust in England will implement the dbMotion interoperability and aggregation software.

Interoperability vendor Intersystems has a new contract in England. Lincolnshire Health and Care has selected the HealthShare health information exchange software to better serve the 730,000 residents in its service area. The initiative is part of the National Health Service “Five Year Forward View” to improve connectivity and patient outcomes. Use of the technology is expected to save up to $5.75 million in U.S. dollars annually by reducing unnecessary imaging and lab tests.

Reliance ACO, a group of independent physicians in southeast Michigan, is the first customer for a new chronic care management service from Computer Sciences Corp. The physicians are not affiliated with any one medical system and have declined to participate in accountable care organizations, but are working together to better coordinate care.