PHILADELPHIA – Wolters Kluwer Health announced Wednesday that it will acquire Cleveland-based Lexi-Comp, Inc., a provider of drug information and clinical content for pharmacists and clinicians.

The acquisition, terms of which were not disclosed, is the latest in a series of strategic acquisitions Wolters Kluwer has made in its Clinical Solutions business as part of the company’s strong focus on serving the point-of-care segment.

[See also: Wolters Kluwer acquires iCare educational EMR software.]

“Wolters Kluwer Health has focused heavily on building a robust suite of clinical decision support solutions for point-of-care use by healthcare professionals, and our acquisition of Lexi-Comp is very much aligned with this strategy,” said Arvind Subramanian, president and CEO of Wolters Kluwer Health Clinical Solutions. “Like Wolters Kluwer Health’s current Clinical Solutions businesses, Lexi-Comp is a leader in providing quality drug information and clinical content designed to help pharmacists and other healthcare professionals make informed and efficient clinical judgments and decisions to improve the quality of care they can provide for their patients."

The acquisition, he says, means that more than 500,000 pharmacists and clinicians in 149 countries will have access to Wolters Kluwer Health Clinical Solutions. "Following completion of the acquisition, our combined businesses will be well-positioned to provide a robust portfolio of clinical decision support solutions for professional customers across the healthcare continuum.”
 
Lexi-Comp provides drug information and medical reference content to more than 1,500 hospitals internationally, and publishes drug monographs covering more than 1,700 products. Lexi-Comp’s clinical information is available to pharmacists and other healthcare professionals online and on a variety of popular mobile devices, as well as through integrated health information systems. To support and supplement effective clinician-patient interactions, Lexi-Comp also provides patient medication leaflets in 19 languages.

[See also: Wolters Kluwer buys Pharmacy OneSource.]
 
The two companies have a long-standing relationship through Wolters Kluwer Health’s UpToDate business. UpToDate offers an electronic clinical information resource via the internet and mobile devices, with one of the world’s largest online clinical information communities including more than 4,400 expert clinicians who function as authors, editors and peer reviewers and over 400,000 users who provide questions and feedback. 

UpToDate covers more than 8,500 topics in 17 medical specialty areas, with integrated Lexi-Comp drug information and clinical content offered through the UpToDate platform.

Wolters Kluwer Health officials say the Lexi-Comp acquisition further strengthen its position in the clinical decision support and point-of-care information segments and to provide customers with even more robust drug information and clinical content offerings for both hospital pharmacies and overall hospital enterprises. It will also enable pharmacist, physician and nurse customers to use an extended suite of mobile capabilities and online platforms.