Sage Announces First of Its Healthcare Clients to Achieve Stage 1 Meaningful Use Medicare Incentive

TAMPA, FL--(Marketwire - May 24, 2011) - Sage Healthcare Division, a unit of Sage North America, announced today that its client, Dr. Moore & Associates, a primary care practice in Brooklyn, NY, is among several of the company's clients to successfully attest to Stage 1 meaningful use under the Medicare EHR Incentive Program.

Dr. Moore & Associates attested on May 4 that they had met the required meaningful use criteria published by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) using the Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition, an ONC-ATCB meaningful use-certified product.

"Meaningful Use sets the course. It moves providers and software vendors in a direction that improves functionality and establishes the roots for interoperability," said Dr. Donald E. Moore of Dr. Moore & Associates. "As a physician that meaningfully uses an electronic medical record, I have become a more knowledgeable clinician and communicate more effectively. As a result, I can better serve my patients."

The CMS Medicare and Medicaid EHR incentive programs provide a financial incentive for the meaningful use of certified EHR technology by eligible professionals to help drive improved quality, efficiency and coordination of care, across the US healthcare system.

The criteria for meaningful use will be presented in three stages over the course of the next five years: Stage 1 sets the baseline for electronic data capture and information sharing and Stages 2 and 3 will continue to expand on this baseline and be developed through future rulemaking, according to CMS. In Stage 1, eligible professionals must meet 20 of the 25 "core" and "menu" meaningful use objectives to receive incentive payments.

As an ONC-ATCB meaningful use-certified product, the Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition includes all of the required functionality to meet Stage 1 meaningful use, including electronic health records, practice management, reporting capabilities and a secure Web-based patient portal from which patients can communicate with physicians, view their health information, schedule appointments, view lab results and request prescription refills. The Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition was designed with ease of adoption as a guiding principle to ensure practices can more easily adapt their workflows to meet Meaningful Use.

"This achievement by Dr. Moore & Associates provides Sage the opportunity to congratulate this practice, an early adopter of EHR, and to encourage and support the many other Sage clients planning to attest to meaningful use," said Betty Otter-Nickerson, president of Sage Healthcare Division. "Sage is committed to its customers. Dr. Moore is evidence of the original success envisioned through the federal program: a successful marriage of technology and provider to improve health outcomes."

Sage has one of the largest U.S. physician practice footprints among software solution providers in the market, providing ambulatory healthcare systems for 30 years, serving more than 400,000 healthcare professionals including 80,000 physicians in the United States. Each year, Sage clinical physician partners accommodate more than 133 million patient visits in their practices. Sage Healthcare Division is a unit of Sage North America and a major provider of electronic health records and practice management software and services.

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About Moore & Associates
Dr. Moore and Associates, a primary care practice located in Brooklyn, New York, was established in 1988 and for the past 23 years has provided quality comprehensive healthcare to adult and adolescent patients, including care for acute and chronic illnesses.

The practice first implemented the integrated Sage Intergy practice management and EHR solution in January 2005, taking advantage of the ability to customize the system to meet the practice's workflow and adopting features like e-prescribing, bi-directional lab interfaces, structured clinical documentation, evaluation and management coding support. In 2010, the practice upgraded to Sage Intergy Meaningful Use Edition, which includes meaningful use reporting dashboards and a patient portal. This was made possible with grant funding provided by the Medical Society of the State of New York's Health Information Technology Pilot Program.

About Sage Healthcare Division
Sage Healthcare Division provides integrated electronic health records, EDI applications and practice management systems to approximately 80,000 physicians and thousands of ambulatory care practices throughout North America. These systems enable physicians and practice managers to better manage their practices and improve quality of care. Sage Healthcare Division is based in Tampa, Fla., and is a division of Sage North America. For more information, please visit www.sagehealth.com or call (877) 932-6301. Follow Sage Healthcare Division on Facebook, http://www.facebook.com/SageHealthcare, and Twitter, http://twitter.com/#!/sagehealthcare.

About Sage North America
Sage North America is part of The Sage Group plc, a leading global supplier of business management software and related products and services, principally for small to medium-sized businesses. Sage North America employs 3,900 people and supports more than 3 million small and midsized business customers. Formed in 1981, Sage was floated on the London Stock Exchange in 1989. Sage has more than 6 million customers and 13,600 employees worldwide. We operate in over 24 countries covering the UK, Europe, North America, South Africa, Australia, India and China. For more information, please visit the website at www.sagenorthamerica.com. Follow Sage North America on Facebook, http://www.facebook.com/SageNorthAmerica, and Twitter, http://twitter.com/#!/sagenamerica.

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