Meditech upgrade begins this October, Mox exits in July

As you may have read in The Scoop, our Meditech software will begin the first phase of upgrade October 1, 2009. The project has been dubbed NORMA, which stands for No One Runs Meditech Alone. The goal is to achieve a fully electronic medical record. The project is slated to take 5 years total. The federal government is requiring hospitals to have fully electronic medical records by 2014.

In other technology news, we will bid farewell to the Mox mail system this summer (approximately July). The Mox email system will be replaced by Microsoft Outlook 2007. All persons with an "@bch.org" email address will automatically be converted to Outlook so that the hospital will only be using one email method. With Outlook, you will have a global directory of hospital email addresses to select and send emails to (which is much easier than the current system). Outlook will also provide a calendar which will help you keep track of meetings or other important events. The calendar will also allow you to see who is busy and who is free.

Policies in Mox will be moved to an online Internet portal system called SharePoint. SharePoint will keep track of the changes in policies and alert you when changes are made. SharePoint promises to be more user-friendly when searching for policies. SharePoint will be the central location to view important announcements and access the latest edition of The Scoop.

In the meantime, you are encouraged to clean out your Mox inbox and delete whatever files you do not want. This will make the transition from Mox to Outlook much easier and less time-consuming.

Key dates:

• July 2009 - Mox replaced by MS Outlook, Mox Policies replaced by SharePoint.
• October 2009 - Meditech MAGIC, Client/Server functionality will be replaced. This includes Admissions, Lab, Pharmacy, Imaging, Order Entry, Billing, Materials Management, and everything else that works off Meditech today.
• 2010 - OR will replace their current system, PICIS, with new online clinical documentation.
• 2011 - Online Nursing documentation and medication dispensing.
• 2012 - Physician order management and clinical documentation.

More information and training will be coming up in the months ahead.