Cerner EHR Integration Boosts Access to COVID-19 Therapeutics

The White House announced last week that it has asked health IT vendors, including Cerner, for their support in providing COVID therapeutics within the EHR. 

Incorporating this information would make it easier to prompt doctors with information about treatments and locations when interacting with a patient, which is set to streamline patient access to COVID-19 oral antivirals.

In an emailed statement to EHRIntelligence, Cerner officials noted that the company will continue to integrate the latest drug therapeutics into its clinical content, including reference materials and drug-to-drug interactions to warn of potential contraindications with other drugs the patient is taking.  

The EHR vendor will also provide end-users with prescribing suggestions for specific treatments or therapeutics based on appropriateness for the patient from the Office of Assistant Secretary for Preparedness & Response (ASPR) recommendations.

Cerner will directly integrate ASPR’s COVID-19 Therapeutics Locator site within EHR clinical workflows so providers can check a drug’s availability and location when prescribing.

“We have the obligation to use health data to make care delivery more dignified, equitable, and cost-effective,” David Feinberg, Cerner president and CEO, noted in the emailed statement.

“Since the onset of the pandemic, Cerner has worked with health systems and organizations around the world, including the federal government, to support the tracking and treatment of COVID-19,” he added. “We will continue to place knowledge and data in front of caregivers so they can deliver the best treatments possible for their communities.” 

Since the onset of COVID-19, Cerner has worked with public and commercial health systems to support the tracking and treatment of COVID-19.

For example, the vendor’s platform supports an open ecosystem via FHIR APIs, enabling clients to use an app that automates COVID-19 case reporting to public health authorities.

At the center of Cerner’s electronic case reporting (eCR) solution is AIMS, a CDC-funded, cloud-based national information messaging platform developed by the Digital Bridge National Coalition and maintained by the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL).

AIMS contains the decision support engine for trigger codes of more than a hundred conditions determined by the coalition and the reporting requirements of all the state public health agencies.

If a patient is found to have evidence of one of the conditions, an Electronic Initial Case Report (eICR) document is created and sent to the AIMS platform. Then, with decision support, the platform decides if the data is reportable or not. If it is, the report is routed to appropriate public health agencies, and a reportability response goes back to the provider.