Lexicomp

Lexi-Data, now the data of choice of ambulatory and other EMR and practice management systems and developers

Friday, January 27, 2012 by David Wilkof

I have had several comments asking for me to repeat several of my recent blog posts, so here they are:

The first one:

"In a few short years, Lexicomp has gone from being the provider of choice for drug reference information to the vendor of choice for EMR development companies looking for a supplier of drug data to include in their product.   Lexi-Data provides all of the standard drug information that one would expect from the other suppliers, but it also provides the best pediatric dosing information available.   In addition to supplying the expected information such as drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions, adverse drug events, RxNorm mapping, generic drug lists, drug nomenclature, and more. Lexi-Data offers an incredibly easy to use data structure and API's and most importantly, Lexicomp is unparalleled in its customer service and providing assistance in the development process. If you are developing a new EMR and need a drug information supplier, make sure that Lexi is on your list."

The second: (enjoy)

"We live in a turbulent and fast changing world. What was good yesterday is not necessarily what is best for today.   Where is Netscape?   How about Alta Vista?    Lotus is certainly history but how many of you remember Multiplan and before that VisiCalc? The changes occur quickly -- not like the phasing out of a buggy whip.

The same could be said about more and more EMR developers who are turning to Lexi-Data for their drug information.    Lexi-Data just hit the scene a little more than two years ago. And how quickly it has grown and capturing a major part of new EMR development in need of drug information. Why so?

Is it about drug information quality?   Is it about ease of integrating the APIs?   How about quality of the Pediatric Drug Information and drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions? Or is about the top quality customer support during the development and integration phase, where Lexicomp treats it customers like true partners?"

Needless to say, as you can imagine, it is about all of the above.   If you haven't acted yet, it is about time.

Electronic Prescribing

Tuesday, January 17, 2012 by Ryan Smith

It is estimated that approximately 7,000 deaths occur each year in the United States due to medication errors. Studies conclude that e-prescribing is the solution to improved patient safety and reducing sky-rocketing medication costs.

Lexicomp understands that for most practices, moving from paper to an electronic medical record or electronic health records can a challenge. Lexicomp has the drug information foundation which was built for healthcare IT professionals. Lexicomp provides the drug reference and data content you need to get your system certified sooner. When you choose our Lexi-Data product, you'll get superior customer service, easy implementation, and timely updates.

HIMSS 2012--Come see the preferred drug information database

Friday, January 13, 2012 by Michelle Curren

More EMRs are calling Lexi-Data their preferred choice every month, why might you ask?

Better quality information with faster updates and fewer mistakes

A more clinically relevant focus that their end users valued

Easier implementation and more powerful functionality

Superior customer service

Unique content not available elsewhere, like Lexicomp’s industry-leading Pediatric Dose Range Checking

Come see for youself! Lexicomp will be exhibiting at HIMSS 2012 in Las Vegas from February 20 - 24. Stop by for a visit at Booth #5134 and learn more about the preferred choice of drug information databases!

Are you going to HIMSS 2012 looking for a drug database provider?

Thursday, January 12, 2012 by Michelle Curren

Lexicomp will be attending HIMSS 2012 in Las Vegas. This will be a great opportunity for any EMR, Hospital, or Consumer Health Site to visit booth #5134 and learn about our solutions for implementing decision support for drug interactions, duplicate therapy, drug allergies, and dose range checking, as well as drug databases, and patient education information for consumers.

At HIMSS 2012 there will be live demonstrations showing how our drug databases can be implemented and customized to meet the various specific needs of EMR vendors. Stop by and see us if you are a current customer or are looking to implement drug information or clinical decision support into your application.

HIMSS 2012: Lexicomp Provides Superior Drug Interaction Data

Wednesday, January 11, 2012 by Michelle Curren

Lexi-Data, Lexicomp's clinical decision support database is perfect for EMR vendors looking to meet a number of Meaningful Use requirements:

Allows for specific clinical decision support functions, including drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checking
Has consumer-facing patient education materials
Is compliant with the RxNorm
Include comprehensives reference information for the US including drug generic name, drug brand name, drug classifications, and eventually clinical dosage guidelines for calculating pediatric and adult doses

Lexicomp will be exhibiting at HIMSS 2012 in Las Vegas, from February 20 - 24. Stop by for a visit at Booth #5134 and learn more about the choices you have in drug information databases!

Why Lexi-Data is now the drug data of choice for EMR's and their developers

Thursday, January 5, 2012 by David Wilkof

In a few short years, Lexicomp has gone from being the provider of choice for drug reference information to the vendor of choice for EMR development companies looking for a supplier of drug data to include in their product. Lexi-Data provides all of the standard drug information that one would expect from the other suppliers, but it also provides the best pediatric dosing information available. In addition to supplying the expected information such as drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions, adverse drug events, RxNorm mapping, generic drug lists, drug nomenclature, and more. Lexi-Data offers an incredibly easy to use data structure and API's and most importantly, Lexicomp is unparalleled in its customer service and providing assistance in the development process. If you are developing a new EMR and need a drug information supplier, make sure that Lexi is on your list.

Why EMRs and Practice Management Systems are turning to Lexi-Data for drug information

Tuesday, December 27, 2011 by David Wilkof

We live in a turbulent and fast changing world. What was good yesterday is not necessarily what is best for today.   Where is Netscape?   How about Alta Vista?    Lotus is certainly history but how many of you remember Multiplan and before that VisiCalc? The changes occur quickly -- not like the phasing out of a buggy whip.

The same could be said about more and more EMR developers who are turning to Lexi-Data for their drug information.    Lexi-Data just hit the scene a little more than two years ago. And how quickly it has grown and capturing a major part of new EMR development in need of drug information. Why so?

Is it about drug information quality?   Is it about ease of integrating the APIs?   How about quality of the Pediatric Drug Information and drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions? Or is about the top quality customer support during the development and integration phase, where Lexicomp treats it customers like true partners?

Needless to say, as you can imagine, it is about all of the above.   If you haven't acted yet, it is about time.

Are you developing EMRs and practice management systems where speed to market is critical?

Monday, December 19, 2011 by David Wilkof

Are you developing EMRs and practice management systems where speed to market is critical? One of the modules of such systems is the inclusion of drug information. Since this is neither the expertise of your developers nor your content people, it is important to identify the preferred drug information provider early in the process. Four criteria are critical in making this decision. First, quality of information. Second, flexibility of design and APIs. Third, simplicity of data structure. Fourth, and very important, customer support during the development period and after release. More and more EMRs are now using Lexicomp drug information as part of their offering. And there is a reason for that.

Lexi-Data is the foundation of Lexicomp's clinical decision support architecture is quickly becoming the standard for when companies need an up-to-date comprehensive drug database. This product provides patient specific alerts and referential content to support sound treatment decisions in areas such as drug interaction checking (drug-drug and drug-food), drug allergy checking, therapeutic duplication checking, RxNorm Mappings, supports Surescripts Certification, Drug Classifications, dose range checking (adult and pediatric), Patient Education, Pediatric and neonatal drug interactions and more.

Electronic Prescribing

Monday, December 12, 2011 by Ryan Smith

ePrescribing is offered as a way to prevent medication errors that arise due to difficulties in reading or understanding handwritten prescriptions. ePrescribing could also reduce adverse drug events (ADEs) by making information such as drug interactions and contraindications available to prescribers at the time they are preparing a prescription.

Lexi-Data is the foundation of Lexicomp's clinical decision support architecture is quickly becoming the standard for when companies need an up-to-date comprehensive drug database. This product provides patient specific alerts and referential content to support sound treatment decisions in areas such as drug interaction checking (drug-drug and drug-food), drug allergy checking, therapeutic duplication checking, RxNorm Mappings, supports Surescripts Certification, Drug Classifications, dose range checking (adult and pediatric), Patient Education, and more.

EMR's now have a web services option to access drug data

Thursday, December 1, 2011 by David Wilkof

Lexicomp has now released the second phase of a comprehensive web services solution to EMR developers to access drug information. For those EMR and Practice Management systems that do not want to store drug information in their product, they now have an option. In the second phase, Lexicomp has released web services to include a proprietary Black Box warning decision tool to reduce alert overload. Phase II also include dose range checking (DRC) and 12 new searching tools.

For EMR developers that have need for any of the following drug nformation or tools in their product, Pediatric Dose Range Checking (Lexicomp is the leader in this area); Patient Education Materials; Drug Interaction Software; RxNorm Mapping; Medicine Lists, Generic Drugs; Dose Information; ePrescribing, and more--- they should call Lexicomp.

Development slowed by your drug information database provider? 3 tips!

Sunday, November 27, 2011 by Matt Bennardo

EMR and EHR vendors are discovering that the responsiveness of their data providers can have a big impact on their ability to get certification or get to market. This is especially true in drug interaction databases, where the quality of the data can affect crucial product goals like Meaningful Use certification or SureScripts eprescribing certification.

Even beyond certification, a data provider can affect how quickly you can develop new features, respond to customer requests, or even whether you can develop new and necessary functionality at all. In many ways, a drug information vendor is one of a health IT developer's most important partners.

What if the partnership doesn't work out?
Real problems can arise if this partner is unresponsive or doesn't provide the expected level of customer service and new feature development. An EHR or EMR can literally be left treading water in situations such as these. What to do? Here are three tips.

1. "Bolt on" additional functionality: For some functionality, it's possible to lease an already-certified third-party solution that will help you meet short-term needs if your own development is stalled. The classic case for this electronic prescribing -- many EMR developers use pre-existing third-party eprescribing modules to get them to market faster while developing their own. One provider of such modules is DoseSpot.

2. Use web services to easily integrate multiple sources: Sometimes a single source just doesn't have everything you need, but maintaining multiple in-house databases can be costly and time-consuming. For specific bits of information you want to add -- for instance, patient education documents in foreign languages -- it may be easiest to access a second vendor using web services. This puts the responsibility for maintaining the data on the vendor, and leaves you with a much smaller development and maintenance task. One drug data provider, Lexicomp, now supplies much core functionality through web services, including all major Meaningful Use Stage 1 items.

3. Cut the anchor as soon as you can: Sometimes all you can do is look for another provider. The two items above can help you in some circumstances, but for core functionality you may need to cut your losses. The earlier you can identify a bad relationship, the better. One customer of Lexicomp came to us after unsuccessfully trying to work with another vendor's dataset. After a short while with the other database, they knew it wasn't right, and so they were able to painlessly replace the data with Lexicomp's. In less than a month after that, their product was live.

The moral of the story is that your drug vendor relationships are crucial to your success. If they don't feel right, then stop and look for alternatives. A slight delay upfront is better than being trapped with a vendor who makes it more difficult for you to meet your customers' needs and innovate new features.

Avoiding the EMR user's worst nightmare: Alert fatigue

Saturday, November 26, 2011 by Matt Bennardo

As EMRs and EHRs incorporate more and more functions, they are going to be giving more advice and warnings to their users. A very real concern among many developers of health informatics systems is "alert fatigue" -- the idea that too many irrelevant alerts will annoy users. And worse, that a flood of useless alerts will cause users to ignore all alerts and warnings, rendering the system's automated checks pointless.

The only way to limit alert fatigue is to be more intelligent about when alerts are shown, and to whom. The key problem is not "too many alerts" -- it's "too many irrelevant alerts". There are two strategies that can help with this.

1. Allow users to customize their own alerts

Each user of your system likely has their own login which is theirs alone. This means that savvy EHR vendors can make it possible for clinicians to customize their own alerts. When an alert is shown, they can select whether they want to see the alert again -- in effect, controlling the information they see by telling the system not to show them alerts they consider irrelevant.

2. Intelligently manage alerts by types of users and circumstances

Another strategy is for the system to do some of this work ahead of time. If an alert applies only to administration, the system would know to show the alert to the prescribing doctor or the compounding pharmacist -- but instead only to the administering nurse. Likewise, if an alert applies only to pregnant women, the system would know not to show it if the patient in question is a man. This strategy relies on knowing things about your users (e.g., what kind of cilnician they are) and the circumstances of the encounter to anticipate which alerts may be irrelevant.

The most successful EMRs will likely use a combination of both approaches. But the second strategy can help alleviate alert fatigue immediately -- your users don't have to manage their own preferences to see the benefits. However, it also relies on detailed drug interaction databases able to finely slice alerts for you. Lexicomp is one medication information vendor that is innovating in this arena, and creating complex filters for many of its alerts and warnings.

5 Benefits of Lexicomp's Drug Interaction Database

Friday, November 25, 2011 by Matt Bennardo

Lexicomp is increasingly the preferred choice of EHR and EMR vendors for pharmaceutical and clinical information. What benefits do they deliver for developers?

Meaningful Use support: Including drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checking
Superior customer service: Every customer receives personal service, no matter the size
Advanced filtering options: A unique system of complex filters allows users to target Black Boxed Warnings to particular users and circumstances
Trusted content and name: Thousands of physicians, pharmacists, nurses, dentists, and other clinicians buy information direct from Lexicomp because they trust it
Full support for eprescribing: Customers have used Leicomp's clinical decision support to create their own e-prescribing modules for EMRs and EHRs

These are just five of the many benefits that Lexicomp customers enjoy. To find out more, request a demonstration today!

Lexicomp is now the preferred drug reference database for EMR and EHR vendors

Thursday, November 24, 2011 by Matt Bennardo

Lexicomp's drug interaction database has grown by leaps and bounds over the past few years. Now used by hundreds of EMR, EHR, HIS and other healthcare vendors, it is the information behind medication reference and clinical decision support for tens of thousands of physicians.

What makes Lexicomp the preferred choice?

Easier implementation when compared to other data sources
Superior customer service for all customers, regardless of size
Full support of Meaningful Use Stage 1 clinical decision support requirements
New innovative features like patient education in multiple languages
Flexible delivery, including robust APIs and web services

More and more healthcare information vendors are discovering that Lexicomp can save them development time, making the road to certification and market faster and smoother. Find out today if Lexicomp can do the same for you!

Are you looking for a complete collection of patient focused drug information for your web site, patient portal, or kiosk?

Wednesday, November 23, 2011 by Ryan Smith

Lexicomp provides companies with with the ncessary tools to integrate drug-drug interaction data, drug-food interaction checking information, drug–allergy checking information, therapeutic duplication checking information, drug images, and patient education leaflets which are available in 19 different languages.

If you are interested in increasing your web site traffic with the industry trusted brand of Lexicomp, please contact us today to learn more. We can help you increase the patients awareness related to the education of drug information questions or concerns that patients commonly have.

If you are being asked to develop a site (I’m speaking to the developers out there), getting up and running is typically a top priority. Lexicomp understand that speed of implementation is critical. We have a number of delivery methods of content available including a downloadable version from a FTP site which would be stored within your database environment or we also offer Web Services which is the ability to make real-time calls over the web. Developers also have access to our team of engineers who are dedicated to making your integration build seamless.

Selecting the right drug interaction database in developing an new EHR

Monday, November 21, 2011 by David Wilkof

As Matt Bennardo pointed out, when EMR and EHR companies are under development and they are looking to include drug and medicine information, they must given proper consideration to the quality of the drug information, the ease of installation, and the level of customer service provided by the drug data provider. In order to meet the Meaningful Use standards, the EMR and EHR developers now care more about drug and medicine information than ever before. They now care about drug interactions, drug-drug and drug-allergy interactions, adverse drug events, patient education pamphlets, dose information, pediatric dosing inforamation, drug brand names and drug generic names.

Hundreds of Lexi-Data customers are now integrating Lexicomp reference and transaction drug information into their systems under development. As Matt had said:

"Comprehensive data covers all decision support Meaningful Use requirements:

Compatible with required standards like RxNorm
Supports drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checking
All data necessary for ePrescribing and CPOE
Additional functionality like dose range checking

Fastest and easiest integration gets you to market faster:

Easy-to-use APIs and web services -- you choose which you want
Superior one-on-one customer service
Most intuitive data structure and fastest implementation

New features set you apart from the competition:

Black Box Warning filters to alleviate clinician alert fatigue
Patient education available in 19 languages

Click the links on this page to find out more about Lexi-Data now!"

Web-Services: the Perfect Solution for Meaningful Use Compliance?

Tuesday, November 15, 2011 by Michelle Curren

Lexicomp recently developed a considerable set of web services calls that provide the most used functionality without the need for localized database integration. This means that EHRs for specialists like chiropractors, dentists, oncologists, dermatologists, and more now have a new way to provide more value to their users.

How?
Web services allow users to request data via the web when they need it, delivering it directly into their application. This is particularly useful for those that need an inexpensive and quick to implement solution.

If you are considering web service providers, consider Lexicomp who supplies a solution directly to their own database of medicine and clinical information while also fulfilling all Stage 1 requirements! In addition, they have web service delivery of patient education materials!

Benefits of a Drug Interaction Databse for EHR Vendors and Patient Portals

Thursday, October 27, 2011 by Matt Bennardo

Lexicomp is the seller of Lexi-Data, a transactional drug interaction database for EHR vendors, EMR vendors, HIS systems, ePrescribers, PMS systems, consumer websites, patient portals, and more. Hundreds of Lexi-Data customers are integrating Lexicomp's referential and clinical decision support information into their own systems and products.

Comprehensive data covers all decision support Meaningful Use requirements:

Compatible with required standards like RxNorm
Supports drug-drug and drug-allergy interaction checking
All data necessary for ePrescribing and CPOE
Additional functionality like dose range checking

Fastest and easiest integration gets you to market faster:

Easy-to-use APIs and web services -- you choose which you want
Superior one-on-one customer service
Most intuitive data structure and fastest implementation

New features set you apart from the competition:

Black Box Warning filters to alleviate clinician alert fatigue
Patient education available in 19 languages

Click the links on this page to find out more about Lexi-Data now!

Using Black Box Warnings to prevent adverse drug events.

Monday, October 24, 2011 by Chris Madjerich

Anyone who has been exposed to electronic order entry has experienced the dreaded "alert fatigue". If the goal of electronic prescribing is to improve patient safety and outcomes, alerting clinicians to potential drug interactions or other dosing precautions is necessary. In our current information age, there is a plethora of information available regarding medication safety and potential safety issues with the use of medications. In an attempt to help clinicians sift through all this information, the FDA has established the use of a "Black Box Warning" to call attention to the most important safety issues. A recent study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine reviewed several drug information providers comparing their ability to identify black box warnings and confirmed that Lexicomp is the leader in this area.

In an effort to incorporate this valuable information into the clinician's busy workflow, Lexcomp has recently enhanced their Lexi-Data product to include Black Box Warnings. The Black Box Warnings table allows system vendors to present critical medication safety information from these warnings within a health information system. The data is also structured in a way that will allow the system vendors to filter which alerts are presented, allowing for instance a prescriber to see warning specific to the ordering process and a pharmacist seeing warnings more relevant to the dispensing process.

Improving patient safety requires the use of "intelligent alerting", Lexi-Data has given system vendors the ability to present critical safety information in a meaningful way.

Eliminate Alert Fatigue with Customized Drug Database

Friday, October 21, 2011 by David White

Alert fatigue is related to the barrage of messages provided clinical decision support systems which can overwhelm a provider and cause them to ignore messages. The alerts, while found to be helpful in some cases, can result in a type of "fatigue" whereby the provider, after receiving too many alerts, begins to ignore and/or override the alerts. Receiving too many alerts can result in slowing the provider down rendering the alert useless.

One of the key reasons that clinicians are frustrated with decision support related to drug interaction software is the potential for this alert fatigue. Clinicans do not want to be messaged regarding dosage precautions related to an interaction which has already been recognized and addressed. It is particularly important in the era of electronic prescribing to engineer systems which can present the appropriate information to the appropriate person. Systems need to recognize whether an individual has previously addressed the issue, rather than simply blindly alerting to the presence of two medications within the medicine list. A collaborative effort between drug database providers and application vendors is needed, and discussions to improve the quality of alerts, while decreasing the quantity, are moving forward. These will greatly improve satisfaction with these tools.

Not all clinical information is structured the same!
The more detail that your medication and clinical information vendor provides about crucial alerts, the easier it is for you to implement customization for your users. If every alert looks the same (which is true of what many vendors provide!), then that means that your users will have to go through them all one by one, setting their preferences on warnings and dosage precautions by hand. Then they have to keep their settings up to date as new alerts are added. That's not user friendly design!

By contrast, Lexicomp's implementation of Black Box Warnings (also called Black Boxed Warnings) gives a great deal of flexibility to developers to allow for multi-dimensional customization. Each warning contains information about which clinician the alert is intended for, how severe the alert is, and whether the alert applies only to patients with specific conditions (e.g., pregnancy).

Win customer loyalty by automating alert customization!
This way, you can automate much of the customization without having to ask for input from every individual user. You can simply have the system hide alerts intended for nurses from pharmacists, and vice-versa. Likewise, you can make your system intelligent enough to hide alerts related to pregnancy from male patients. This is the kind of smart implementation that users are looking for to help them aviod alert fatigue and become more efficient and effective clinicians. Talk to Lexicomp today to learn more!