Worried that medication prescribed by a Kaiser Permanente emergency-room doctor in Baldwin Park wasn't helping her chronic asthma, Andrea Edwards went to see her regular physician.
Dr. Kevin Rossi, whose office is 15 miles away in Kaiser's Downey clinic, ordinarily might have ordered X-rays or stronger medication. But because Kaiser has begun to put many patient records into a systemwide database, he was able to discover that Edwards had been prescribed cough syrup and an antibiotic, not the prednisone she thought she was taking.
"I was able to get out of there in 30 minutes -- with the right medicines," said Edwards, 20. "I could see my records. Having them be available electronically makes it easier for all the doctors I have to coordinate my care."
Eventually all of Kaiser's 8.3 million members nationwide will find their records available electronically. Nowhere is the conversion moving more aggressively than in Southern California, where a new leader has made the project a priority.
Three months ago, Dr. Benjamin Chu, 52, became president of Kaiser's Southern California region, which serves 3.1 million members with a budget of more than $11 billion and runs 11 medical centers from Bakersfield to San Diego. Kaiser also is in the midst of a $7-billion campaign to replace or expand many of those hospitals, and intends to build two more by 2008.
Among Chu's qualifications: he headed New York City's Health & Hospitals Corp., a public system serving 1.3 million patients that made the switch to computerized records on his watch.
Chu said that Kaiser's unique integrated model attracted him to his new job.
"We're not just an HMO plan, we're a provider as well," he said. "That's a powerful model."
As a result, he said, "All the pieces are here," not only for computerizing records, but for using that system to cut costs and improve care.
"Once you know who in your population has what illnesses and how severe they are, you can think creatively about getting the healthcare system not to be just reactive but proactive," he said. "Our mission is to keep people as healthy as possible, even before they get sick."
Oakland-based Kaiser Permanente is America's largest nonprofit health insurer. Formed in 1942 for Kaiser shipyard and steelworkers, it opened to the general public in 1945. Now controlled in part by the 11,000 doctors who work for it, Kaiser believes its integrated system lets it break down barriers that can add cost or create confusion.
