Boise, ID and Kingwood, TX (Feb. 13, 2019) — Kno2 announced today that they were selected, in collaboration with Vision Source, as the recipients for the ‘Empower Your Care Teams and Employees’ category of Microsoft Corp.’s 2019 Health Innovation Awards.
The awards, which were announced at the 2019 HIMSS Annual Conference and Exhibition in Orlando, Florida, recognize health organizations and their technology solution partners for using Microsoft’s intelligent health technologies in innovative ways that help empower care teams, improve clinical and operational outcomes, and advance precision health care. The 2019 winners are impacting the industry by creating breakthrough solutions that empower health and life sciences organizations while meeting global, local and industry-specific compliance and security standards.
Kno2’s Interoperability as a Service solution, built and run entirely on Microsoft Azure, serves as health care’s largest network aggregator, connecting and normalizing all the major health information networks across the United States. Direct messaging, patient query for providers live on Carequality, including those connected through CommonWell Health Alliance, referral networks, Health Information Exchange (HIE) connectivity and cloud faxing are all provided in a single experience for the sharing and secure exchange of patient information. Through Kno2, providers serving any part of the care continuum gain access to effectively coordinate care with over 2.5M other providers, regardless of their electronic health record (EHR).
“At Vision Source, one of our primary goals is to provide our network member optometrists with cutting-edge technologies that improve patient outcomes and create operational efficiencies when serving primary care providers and health care delivery systems across the country. From the beginning, our team was very excited to embrace an award-winning solution that enhances collaborative care environments,” said Vision Source President and Chief Executive Officer Jim Greenwood. “The combination of Vision Source’s national network of optometrists and Kno2’s best-in-class solution represents a significant milestone with respect to reducing administrative burdens, improving efficiencies and making a difference in the health of our patients.”
In a 2018 pilot, Vision Source practices collaborating with a large regional health system were able to exchange referrals and records between multiple EHR platforms, reducing diabetic eye examination lag time by 80 percent, and streamlining patient data flow for both Vision Source members and the primary care providers. Through these advancements made possible by Kno2’s Interoperability as a Service, patient care gaps were closed within seven to 10 days, rather than the previous time frame of four to 12 weeks, with Vision Source member doctors providing patient results to referring physicians within 48 hours. Kno2 has since been launched across the entire Vision Source network of over 4,500 private practice optometrists.
“While interoperability is realizing meaningful strides in health care,” said Therasa Bell, president and chief technology officer at Kno2, “it’s still defined by many different standards and protocols, ultimately creating a difficult and expensive challenge for each provider to determine how to connect with others in the community with whom they coordinate care. Through Kno2 and Azure, we remove the complexity and expense from the provider and allow for a single, streamlined care coordination workflow that is easily absorbed by a provider.”
“The health industry is undergoing a Digital Transformation in which intelligent health technologies are helping communities and individuals improve care by helping them better understand and share information,” said Chris Sakalosky, vice president, U.S. Health & Life Sciences, Microsoft. “This year’s Microsoft Health Innovation Award recipients are advancing the goals of improved patient engagement and care coordination through their pioneering use of Microsoft cloud and AI services.”
Vision Sources uses Kno2 for Interoperability
Nominations were submitted by health providers, payers, pharmaceutical and life science organizations, and public and private health institutions across the world for applying Microsoft technology to create transformative and highly-effective innovations. An esteemed panel of industry experts selected this year’s winners based on how their innovation represents a forward-thinking development or implementation of a solution that is delivering groundbreaking results and producing better health outcomes for more people. Recipients will be highlighted on the Microsoft in Health blog.
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About Vision Source
Founded in 1991, Vision Source is North America’s most extensive network of independent optometrists consisting of over 4,500 optometrists. The clinicians in the Vision Source network enjoy access to newly evolving patient channels, including an expanding list of leading medical groups and integrated health systems with whom Vision Source optometrists collaborate.
About Kno2
Kno2 is leading health care’s path to interoperability across every patient care setting. Kno2: Interoperability as a Service (IaaS) turns on connectivity to millions of health care providers and the capability to send, receive, find and use patient information with everyone. Kno2’s IaaS enables access to providers via cloud faxing, direct secure messaging, patient information query, and patient care networks (referrals, ACOs, HIEs) guided by connectivity assessments and analytics.
