TAMPA, FL – Sage North America today announced that its Sage Healthcare Division has released Sage Intergy version 6.10 and the new Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition. This Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition features the components required for physicians to be eligible for federal electronic health records (EHR) incentives, a key provision of the 2009 American Reinvestment and Recovery Act of 2009 (ARRA). 

Under ARRA, physicians and other eligible professionals may qualify for bonus payments from Medicare and Medicaid in exchange for demonstrating "meaningful use" or a certified EHR system.

Sage Intergy is a synergistic clinical, financial and administrative solution that helps physicians to improve the quality and efficiency of care they deliver. The Sage Intergy family of products includes integrated practice management, electronic health records, clinical and business intelligence and tools for online patient engagement. Providers can access Sage Intergy from multiple practice locations, from home, or other remote locations either through a central patient database server, or as a Sage-hosted solution on a monthly subscription basis. 

Sage Intergy Version 6.10 includes enhancements designed to meet key industry certifications, such as the CCHIT 2011 Ambulatory EHR certification and upcoming meaningful use certification. The Meaningful Use Edition expands on the core functionality in v6.10 by providing physicians with additional tools for patient engagement and meaningful use reporting.

"In this combined release, Sage is introducing exciting and innovative solutions that will not only help our customers take full advantage of stimulus dollars, but also greatly enhance the practice experience for patients and physicians," said Tony Ryzinski, Senior Vice President of Marketing and Product Management with Sage.

Most significant in this latest Sage Intergy release is a new "MU dashboards" feature. This user-friendly analysis tool is used by providers and practices to track performance against clinical quality measures included in the meaningful use guidelines (such as the percentage diabetic of patients with a hemoglobin A1C of less than or equal to 7 percent). The MU dashboards also allow providers to scorecard performance against indicators that measure how they use the system in relation to the meaningful use criteria (for example, for what percentage of patients they maintain an active problem list).

Version 6.10 also includes enhancements designed to further refine interoperability between Sage Intergy and health information exchanges. Expanding on the already considerable list of online services available to patients from the Sage Intergy Practice Portal, Sage has added the ability for patients to view statements and pay bills online and receive secure health reminders from their providers.

Ryzinski said Sage will be ready for meaningful use certification "as soon as a certification body is announced."

"Once our industry gets past this crucial milestone, it will become increasingly important for healthcare providers and technology vendors alike to understand the broader context of meaningful use," said Ryzinski. "Stimulus dollars are only an incentive to help providers acquire the technology needed to continue their work to transform healthcare and, ultimately, improve healthcare outcomes for patients while creating practice efficiencies. Federal healthcare reform will drive the meaningful adoption of technology and in turn, should allow physicians to refocus on providing care and improving lives through delivery of care in a time when they are constantly forced to meet non-care demands on their time."