iReferral® streamlines and optimizes the organ, tissue, and eye donation and transplantation process via secure referral of potential donors.
Arkansas Children’s Hospital (Arkansas Children’s) and Arkansas Regional Organ Recovery Agency (ARORA) announce the successful launch in January 2023 of the interoperability solution iReferral® provided by InVita Healthcare Technologies (InVita). InVita’s iReferral solution eliminates the need for manual and time-consuming donor referral phone calls by enabling Arkansas Children’s healthcare providers to securely refer patients that meet established clinical criteria for potential organ, tissue, and eye donation directly to ARORA from within the hospital electronic medical record (EMR).
With over 100,000 patients on the nation’s waitlist awaiting a life-saving organ, regulations from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) exist requiring referral by hospital of all prospective organ and tissue donors to their federally designated Organ Procurement Organization (OPO).
“In just a month, we’ve already seen how powerful iReferral can be for patients and families, as well as for our providers,” said Arkansas Children’s Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer Erin Parker. “We have made several successful donor referrals and are grateful this solution allows us to work closely with ARORA to save more lives more quickly than ever.”
“ARORA is grateful to have the opportunity to utilize this new technology to restore more lives through donation,” said Dustin Goad, ARORA’s Director of Quality Systems. He continued, “iReferral will not only lead to more referrals, but it will also give valuable time to the caregiver team providing the referral, and precious time to ARORA staff to evaluate potential donors. This has been a great collaboration that will lead to improvements in efficiency and opportunity to save more lives!”
“We are thrilled to have launched iReferral with Arkansas Children’s and ARORA,” said Todd Collins, President & CEO of InVita Healthcare Technologies. “By deploying iReferral, nursing and provider time can remain focused on patient care while improving donation and transplantation outcomes by streamlining the key initial referral process.”
This iReferral launch deployed an integration leveraging common healthcare interoperability standards released on and available via the Epic EMR Connection Hub (formerly App Orchard, App Market), which enabled further efficiencies throughout the implementation process.
“We consistently seek ways to improve efficiencies across the donation-transplant ecosystem,” said Wade Liu, InVita’s Chief Product Officer and General Manager, Donation & Transplant Division. “With this iReferral launch, we’re so excited for Arkansas Children’s and ARORA to join hospitals and OPOs across the country that have enhanced the critical donor referral workflow to ultimately provide more donors and families with the opportunity to donate and save lives.”
About InVita Healthcare Technologies | invitahealth.com
InVita provides mission-critical and chain-of-custody software technologies for complex medical, forensic, and community care environments. InVita’s solutions streamline clinical workflows, optimize supply chains, sample tracking, and visibility across donation and transplantation, blood and plasma operations, the tissue and implant lifecycle, and environments spanning DNA and forensics. InVita continues to expand the iReferral® and iTransplant® platforms supporting nearly 75% of all OPOs in the United States and used by more than 15,000 medical professionals across more than 100 organ, tissue, eye, and birth tissue organizations around the world.
About Arkansas Children’s Hospital | archildrens.org
Arkansas Children’s is the only healthcare system in the state solely dedicated to caring for Arkansas’ more than 700,000 children. The private, non-profit organization includes two pediatric hospitals, a pediatric research institute and USDA nutrition center, a philanthropic foundation, a nursery alliance, statewide clinics, and many education and outreach programs — all focused on fulfilling a promise to define and deliver unprecedented child health. Arkansas Children’s Hospital is nationally ranked by U.S. News & World Report in seven pediatric specialties (2022—2023): Cancer, Cardiology & Heart Surgery, Diabetes & Endocrinology, Nephrology, Neurology & Neurosurgery, Pulmonology and Urology. Generous philanthropic and volunteer engagement has sustained Arkansas Children’s since it began as an orphanage in 1912, and today ensures the system can deliver on its promise of unprecedented child health.
ARORA| arora.org
ARORA is a non-profit, independent organ procurement agency that was established in 1987. It is headquartered in Little Rock, Arkansas with a regional office in Fayetteville, Arkansas. ARORA’s mission is to restore lives by recovering organs and tissues for transplant. For those listed on the organ transplant waiting list, ARORA is a bridge to new life. For those in need of tissue transplants, ARORA is an agent of restored sight, mobility, ability and freedom from pain.
