ISoft markets Lorenzo modules to trusts

ISoft has announced that it will market components of its electronic patient record, Lorenzo, to hospitals in the UK and worldwide under a Lorenzo smart solution strategy.

Lorenzo, which is due to be delivered to trusts in the North, Midlands and East of England as part of the National Programme for IT in the NHS, will be made available to meet specific market needs in a more modular format called Lorenzo Enterprise suite.

Functionality that will be made available will include new nursing releases for managing day-to-day tasks, clinical forms and correspondence, and clinical noting.

Michael Dahlweid, global chief marketing and medical officer, told E-Health Insider: “These components are specifically designed for faster time to market, quicker revenue and much faster implementation than implanting the full blown Lorenzo.

“Lorenzo Enterprise is outside the CSC contract. Both in the UK and internationally, our smart solution strategy is a variety of components that are addressing specific market needs such as nursing, complex enterprise scheduling, medications management, nursing, A&E, and clinical mobility.”

The functionality, which is technically based on the Lorenzo framework, will be deployed as a standalone product or complimentary to iSoft products such as i.PM and i.CM.

According to iSoft, the modules are based on Microsoft’s Silverlight technology and are “infrastructure light”, so they can be installed without the need for new hardware, additional database licences, or the upheaval of replacing existing systems.

ISoft has  been facing financial problems resulting, in part, from non-payments under NPfIT because of delays to the deployment of Lorenzo under the programme. At the end of August, the company posted a statutory loss of £221m for the financial year of 2010.

Since then, the former chief executive and executive chairman, Gary Cohen, has left the company and a review of its business operations has been carried out.

When asked whether this was a way of rectifying some of the revenue problems that iSoft has been facing, Dahlweid said: “Absolutely, yes. The strategy adoption we have is a reflection of what has happened in the past.

“To wait until a large complex product like Lorenzo would have been ready is not really an option. At the same time, there are market needs that we can meet in other ways, so we have had to make that call.”

Although the company is yet to announce any deals for the modules in the UK, one German hospital will be going live with the functionality to linking 50 GPs with one hospital site by the end of October.

Dahlweid added: “The main trigger was that we saw a variety of market demands which we couldn’t fill based on Lorenzo enterprise suite. In Germany we see huge work in the collaboration’s environment with hospital and ambulatory care working very closely together and there.

“What we have been doing is carving components out of Lorenzo and making them available to areas that need those most.”

Under the new Lorenzo strategy, the company has also promised a policy of delivering quarterly updates of new features and improvements.

Dahlweid added: “We have moved to delivering a pattern of functional and non functional enhancement to the market where a customer can be sure we will deliver such enhancement in a specifc timescale rather than be left in the dark.”

Link: iSOFT