Cerner and Nevada, Mo., Launch Healthy Nevada Project

Published on Monday, 23 July 2012 08:35 Written by TradersHuddle Staff

KANSAS CITY, Mo., July 23, 2012 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Cerner (Nasdaq:CERN) has announced a partnership with the city of Nevada, Mo., to build a new model of health and care that will seamlessly integrate the two environments and create a Healthy Nevada. The project will aim to increase Vernon County and Nevada's ranking in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation annual report from the bottom third to the top third over the next five years. Currently the county ranks 88 out of 115 counties in Missouri for health outcomes and 77 for health factors.

The project will focus on creating a culture of health in the community through education, incentives, infrastructure and partnerships with stakeholders such as the Nevada school district, local employers and community organizations like the Nevada Housing Authority. It will also work to further digitize the health care community in Nevada, including the deployment of Cerner's CommunityWorks™ model at Nevada Regional Medical Center.

"By digitizing our entire health care community, we are creating an environment that will allow for integrated communication among all providers, regardless of their EHR [electronic health record] system," said Judy Feuquay, CEO of Nevada Regional Medical Center. "Eventually, all residents of Nevada will have access to their health information regardless of where they are or which provider they see."

Creating an infrastructure that enables and encourages healthy choices will play a major role in contributing to the improvement of Nevada's health status rankings by:

• Improving the city layout through initiatives like increasing ADA accessible sidewalks and adding bike lanes.
• Partnering with local restaurants and grocery stores to offer healthy choices.
• Encouraging healthy eating and activity with walk to work/school programs, healthy snack carts, easily accessible Farmer's Markets and community gardens.

"Nevada recognizes that health and wellness are fundamental quality of life issues essential to our economic prosperity," said JD Kehrman, Nevada city manager. "The intent of this project is to make the healthy choice the easy choice, ultimately giving our residents more options, more choices and more control over their health and care."

In addition, the Healthy Nevada project aims to decrease 10 percent of the current health care spend in Vernon County by decreasing the demand for services by placing an emphasis on health, wellness and prevention.

"A project of this scope and size has never been done before," said Jeff Townsend, Cerner executive VP and chief of staff. "Cerner has a history of entrepreneurial advocacy and a passion for improving rural health with innovations that reduce cost and improve access and quality. Our goal is to see how quickly we can impact the cost, accessibility and quality of health and care to create a replicable and sustainable model for other communities across the U.S."

About Cerner

Cerner is contributing to the systemic change of health and care delivery. For more than 30 years Cerner has been executing its vision to make health care safer and more efficient. We started with the foundation of digitizing paper processes and now offer the most comprehensive array of information software, professional services, medical device integration, remote hosting and employer health and wellness services. Cerner systems are used by everyone from individual consumers, to single-doctor practices, hospitals, employers and entire countries. Taking what we've learned over more than three decades, Cerner is building on the knowledge that is in the system to support evidence-based clinical decisions, prevent medical errors and empower patients in their care.

Cerner^® solutions are licensed by approximately 9,300 facilities around the world, including more than 2,650 hospitals; 3,750 physician practices; 40,000 physicians; 500 ambulatory facilities, such as laboratories, ambulatory centers, cardiac facilities, radiology clinics and surgery centers; 800 home health facilities; 40 employer sites and 1,600 retail pharmacies.

Certain trademarks, service marks and logos (collectively, the "Marks") set forth herein are owned by Cerner Corporation and/or its subsidiaries in the United States and certain other countries throughout the world. All other non-Cerner Marks are the property of their respective owners. Nasdaq: CERN. For more information about Cerner, please visit www.cerner.com, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

This release contains forward-looking statements that involve a number of risks and uncertainties. It is important to note that the Company's performance, and actual results, financial condition or business could differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements. The words "aim" or "believe" or the negative of these words, variations thereof or similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to: the possibility of product-related liabilities; potential claims for system errors and warranties; the possibility of interruption at our data centers or client support facilities; our proprietary technology may be subject to claims for infringement or misappropriation of intellectual property rights of others, or may be infringed or misappropriated by others; risks associated with our recruitment and retention of key personnel; risks related to our dependence on third party suppliers; changing political, economic, regulatory and judicial influences; government regulation; significant competition and market changes; and, failure of the parties to achieve the intended synergies. Additional discussion of these and other risks, uncertainties and factors affecting the Company's business is contained in the Company's periodic filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The reader should not place undue reliance on forward-looking statements, since the statements speak only as of the date that they are made. The Company undertakes no obligation to update forward-looking statements to reflect changed assumptions, the occurrence of unanticipated events or changes in future operating results, financial condition or business over time.

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