Frustrating the CEO

Virtua Health, a $1 billion hospital group in Marlton, N.J., has used medical software from GE Healthcare and Siemens (among others) for many years. But CEO Richard Miller was frustrated that no single hospital process was electronic from start to finish. For example, nurses could start an electronic medical record for a new patient, but doctors continued to write treatment orders on paper.

"As CEO, I got tired of hearing we're using 20 percent of the functionality of a system," Miller says. Part of the problem was outdated methods of working and a stubborn resistance to change, says Ninfa Saunders, Virtua's chief operating officer. Miller, Saunders and other Virtua executives decided they wanted to remake their hospital into a world-class venue for specific areas of care such as women's health and cardiovascular cases. "We said, 'We don't want to be average anymore,'" Miller notes.

Virtua launched electronic medical records in 2006 and set out to use as many features as possible in its selected products (GE's Centricity PACS, Microsoft's Amalga , and Siemens Healthcare's Soarian). Last year, Miller hired Al Campanella as CIO from consulting firm Deloitte Consulting.

The whole project will cost $125 million, Miller says. The work is mapped out through 2011, with a new "nearly" paperless hospital to open that year. Before spending any money on software, however, Virtua managers from the CEO down used Six Sigma and Lean management techniques to figure out where to start, how to prioritize the work and what organizational and technology skills were needed.