Data General Offers MedScan Family of Document Management Solutions for Improved Processing of Healthcare Information At Lower Cost.

ATLANTA--(BW HealthWire)--Feb. 22, 1999--

At HIMSS '99 Data General Announces Strategic Alliance with

BlueChip Technologies; Showcases Integrated Forms and Imaging

Solutions that Offer Hospitals and Clinics a Smooth Path to the

`Paperless' Future

Healthcare providers can move towards a paperless work environment at their own pace, using an integrated family of document management and imaging solutions announced today by Data General Corporation.

The MedScan family of solutions provides both a Targeted Department and Enterprise Scaleable approach to solving the various document management challenges that face today's healthcare enterprises. This building block approach allows the customer to deploy imaging technology at one or more target areas with the confidence that respective area requirements will be met without compromising the enterprise strategy.

Data General's MedScan document management and imaging solutions can provide process enhancement and reduced costs for Business Office, Administration Management, Compliance and Clinical Records areas through robust document capture, processing, workflow, storage and retrieval. The MedScan family is available in several software modules that work independently or together. Customers that have implemented a Meditech Healthcare Information System (HIS) can benefit even more due to tight integration supported by both Meditech and Data General. To ensure complete support for the widely used Meditech environment, the Data General development team worked closely with Meditech in creating the MedScan solutions.

The MedScan modules also works seamlessly with the "smart E-form" Suite(TM) forms-automation software offered by Data General under its recently announced reseller agreement with BlueChip Technologies. The "smart E-form" Suite(TM) can be used in updating patient history, billing and many other healthcare record-keeping applications that now depend on manual processing of pre-printed paper forms.

BlueChip's "smart E-form" Suite(TM) available from Data General, gives healthcare providers an essential first step toward imaging-based document management. Instead of purchasing thousands of pre-printed standard forms that have to be stored and then discarded when changes are needed, users of the "smart E-form" Suite software can choose designs from a form dictionary, print forms as needed, and edit them electronically. Nine different configurations offer a variety of tracking, printing, scanning and auto-faxing capabilities.

During its recent conversion to Meditech client/server architecture, Exeter Hospital in Exeter, New Hampshire, used BlueChip software to completely re-engineer the forms used in patient admitting and registration. "The "smart E-form" Suite system is entirely managed by remote access and forms can be updated the next day if necessary," said Keith Murrow, the hospital's director of information systems. "We even enabled electronic forms for our purchase orders, payroll and accounts payable MICR check printing."

"Hospitals and clinics can save thousands of dollars in one-time supply costs and hundreds of thousands in recurring administrative costs by replacing their pre-printed forms and paper-based systems," said Marc Luce, director of systems integration for Data General Healthcare. "The problem has been transitioning to paperless document management in a way that fits organizational reality. With the MedScan Document Imaging solutions, we're providing our healthcare customers with a safe, economical, step-by-step process for moving to electronic forms and software-guided workflow."

"By implementing MedScan Clinical Department Edition for our LAB, we achieved immediate payback while proving the concept to administration and staff. Now that we have seen the success of the solution we are excited about implementing it across our hospital enterprise," states Bill Bollig, chief information officer and systems administrator at Martin Memorial Hospital in Florida. "By creating a complete picture of a patient's clinical history instead of the traditional fragmented view, the MedScan solution has improved efficiency for the health system and physician's practices while improving patient care and satisfaction overall. Combined with our Meditech's HIS and MedArchive, we are on our way to a integrated longitudinal electronic patient record."

MedScan Solution Family

-- MedScan Forms Automation Edition, offering BlueChip Technologies' "smart E-form" Suite, Data General reduces costs and saves storage space by replacing traditional pre-printed forms with electronic forms that automate hospital functions such as Admission, Discharge and Transfer (ADT).

-- MedArchive/Object Archive, a high-volume, high-capacity data-archiving module that provides rich integration tools that allow any production system to manage virtually any object type. Mixed media support (RAID magnetic, magneto-optical, CD-ROM, DVD) with robust cache management and online backups provides the most desirable solution features. Supporting MedScan Modules and Meditech, this solution has over 150 installed units supporting hundreds of healthcare providers in countries all over the globe.

-- MedScan Folder Archive, is a cost-effective approach to implementing document management technology as a replacement for paper folder storage or microform processes. Since the platform technology is the same, upgrading to one of the enhanced focused MedScan modules is a simple process.

-- MedScan Business Office Edition, available as a standalone module or part of a enterprise strategy with HIS integration, is specifically targeted at document management for Patient Billing and Medicare Compliance support.

-- MedScan Administrative Edition, is the cost effective approach to support Administrative areas such as Human Resources, Administrative Management, Purchasing, Material Management, Maintenance, Policies and Procedures and others, with state of the art document management capabilities.

-- MedScan Clinical Department Edition, is a cost-effective approach to solving document management needs for a clinical department area such as ER, Lab or Cardiology. Upgrade path to MedScan Clinical Enterprise Edition and tight integration with Meditech CIS are supported.

-- MedScan Clinical Enterprise Edition, supports the cost-effective deployment of a Enterprise Wide Electronic Medical Record. Both MS Client and Internet Browser access to potentially all patient history can be supported. A fully redundant system capability can solve the disaster recovery challenge still faced by most organizations. Meditech HIS sites that deploy both MedArchive and MedScan benefit from both unsurpassed integration and the ability to support an enterprise-wide electronic patient record.

Data General Showcases Solutions at HIMSS `99

Data General's Healthcare division will demonstrate the MedScan family and a wide range of healthcare solutions, including server and storage technologies and strategic applications, at the HIMSS '99 show, which runs from February 21-25 at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta.

Data General has been a leading provider of healthcare solutions for the past 20 years. Its systems are used by more than 1,200 hospitals worldwide. Data General solutions designed specifically for the healthcare industry include Internet/intranet, point-of-care, decision support, imaging and data warehousing. Data General provides healthcare organizations with total solutions that consist of Intel-based AviiON servers, CLARiiON fault-tolerant disk-array storage subsystems, application software, implementation services, network integration and project management. The company, which is headquartered in Westboro, Massachusetts, reported revenues of $1.5 billion during fiscal 1998.

AViiON and CLARiiON are registered trademarks of Data General Corporation. All other brand names and product names referred to in this press release are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders.