04/07-06   -   Press releases

International eHealth Expert Presents European Success Story to U.S. RHIO: ICW Speaks to Executive Board of Pennsylvania eHealth Initiative

Harrisburg, PA, July 3, 2006 - InterComponentWare (ICW), a leading international healthcare IT solution provider, addressed the PA eHealth Initiative (PAeHI) Executive Board in an educational session to share information about its healthcare technology successes in Europe. Peter Reuschel, CEO of ICW, travelled from Walldorf, Germany, to present strategies and real-life examples of implemented eHealth projects that utilize eHealth Cards (smart card technology), Personal Health Records (PHR), and full interoperability solutions.

The goal of the PAeHI is “…to encourage the development and use of electronic medical records (EMR) in Pennsylvania along with health information exchanges (HIE), which will ultimately tie into a national system allowing patients and health care providers to securely access medical records regionally and throughout the country", says Martin Ciccocioppo, PAeHI Board Chair. ICW has gained experience in addressing similar health technology and system improvement goals in the European Union. In particular, ICW has been involved in projects that support interoperability for health data exchange among healthcare stakeholders and consumer-centric portable health information, which ICW offers via its LifeSensor® PHR.

PAeHI created this opportunity to learn about technologies and solutions, which have been successfully implemented overseas, and determine if the U.S. (and Pennsylvania) can take advantage of lessons learned in Europe. PAeHI has made the audio recording of the ICW presentation and related power point slides available via its website: http://www.paehi.org/resources.asp.

The educational session demonstrates PAeHI’s ongoing efforts to uncover new ideas that can support providers, health insurers, businesses, government and all Pennsylvanians. ICW’s presentation emphasized a web-based, scalable infrastructure model that can enable interoperability among healthcare stakeholders; provide secure, confidential access to and exchange of health information; and enable patient access and control of their information via their patient-owned PHR, LifeSensor.

About InterComponentWare
InterComponentWare AG (ICW) is a leading international eHealth specialist with locations in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the USA, and Bulgaria. Its solutions for networking the various participants in the health care system achieve a sustained improvement in process-oriented communication and data integrity – and thus the quality of medical care. Among other things, ICW develops and markets software and hardware components for the healthcare IT infrastructure for the electronic health card, the personal health record LifeSensor, and network solutions for clinics and physicians in private practice. As part of the bIT4health consortium, ICW has provided important consulting services for the deployment of the electronic health card in Germany and is also involved in the Austrian eCard project.

For more information on Pennsylvania eHealth Initiative please visit www.paehi.org
Research and information provided on the PAeHI web site is presented as an educational service to the broader health care community and is not an endorsement of specific products or services.