H.I.S.-tory by Vince Ciotti

Episode #74: QuadraMed

Part 4:

HDS© 2012 by H.I.S. Professionals, LLC, all rights

reserved.

First: One More QM CEO!• Before we get to HDS, the source of QuadraMed’s EMR today, we

first have the story of one other CEO at Compucare, thanks to Dave Wellons, a past contributor to these HIS-tories, who explains his own background in the IT and HIS industries, and then introduces the missing CEO:– “As usual a great set of slides. It is really interesting

to go back and read about the history that was made from the 1980s until now. I started in HIS in 1984 and have non-healthcare computer experience going back to 1971.

– One QuadraMed person I didn't see mentioned was Jim Peebles. Jim was a founder of SunQuest back in the day, and then teaming with Chris Heller, founded MIDAS who sold the MIDS system to hospitals to do Quality Assurance (as it was called back then).”

Landacorp & MIDAS Connection• “I know this well because Jim and I competed when I was VP of

Sales & Marketing at Landacorp, the first QM/UM system in the market.

• The Landacorp system was built by Bryan Lang based on Joyce Craddick's "Medical Management Analytics", a consulting method to help hospitals do their QA/UM work.

• During my time at Landacorp, we met several times with QuadraMed when they were located in San Rafael, CA and their CEO was Jim Durham, the founder, with talks towards working together, which never materialized.

• MIDAS was written in MUMPS. • Then Jim Peebles 'retired' from MIDAS and next showed up as a

board member of QuadraMed and for a period of time was the acting CEO until the replacement could be found.”

Another HIS-tory Hero• This final episode on the roots of

today’s QuadraMed products covers the story of one of the early pioneers of EMRs before that term was even invented: Dr. Ralph Korpman

• His story is truly amazing, if (like Will Rogers) you “only know what you read in the newspapers,” check this column about his early days at Technicon:

Amazing what you can find on the web…Per the CLINICAL CHEMISTRY JOURNAL, Vol. 40, No. 6, 1994:• “Dr. Korpman is a Professor at Loma Linda University School of

Medicine. He received his Bachelor’s and M.D. degrees there, where he also completed residencies in Anatomic Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and a fellowship in Clinical Hematology. He also attended the Claremont Graduate School where he received a Certificate in Executive Management.

• In 1976, Dr. Korpman founded Medical Data Corporation (MDC) which developed turnkey systems used in hospitals. MDC was acquired by HBOC in 1981, where he served as Chief Scientist.

• He founded Health Data Sciences in 1983, an organization dedicated to the provision of fully integrated, point-of-care based, patient-centered information systems that provide operations optimization, fault tolerant performance, and multi-institutional networking; these systems optimize health care productivity and quality through the use of electronic medical records.”

Check the plate!• This ad from 1990 sums it up:

an EMR that will travel a long & winding road, up to 2012!

• Ulticare had it all back then, not only a very robust suite of clinical apps, including nursing documentation and CPOE, but it also was one of the leaders in “the new thing” back then:

• Bedside Terminals – the mid 80s saw the introduction of PCs and terminals in patient rooms (check out HIS-tory episode #42 for all the details on our web site: hispros.com)

Bedside Market LeaderThis table from Sheldon Dorenfest’s 1988 “Guide” shows how HDS’ UltiCare dominated the bedside market with ten sales in just one year, leading rivals MedTake, CliniCom, etc:

To Be Continued…• Stay tuned for next

week to read how UltiCare was sold to some of the most prestigious names in Healthcare,

• And eventually made some of its biggest sales by selling itself, as the company was sold, and sold, and sold again…

• And the product was renamed and renamed, again and again…