COSEHC and OnePartner join forces to improve cardiovascular disease outcomes

Duffield, VA & Winston-Salem, NC - Dr. Michael A. Moore, President of the Consortium for Southeastern Hypertension Control (COSEHC) and Tom Deaderick, Director of OnePartner, LLC announce an agreement between the two organizations to join forces in the collection and analysis of health care data from the COSEHC Centers of Excellence affiliated network of medical practices.

The Consortium for Southeastern Hypertension Control is a nonprofit voluntary health organization created in 1992 in response to the compelling need to improve the disproportionately high levels of hypertension-related morbidity and mortality throughout the southeastern United States where the highest prevalence of hypertension and the greatest incidence of hypertensive complications exists compared with other geographical regions.

The COSEHC Mission is to reduce morbidity and mortality from hypertension-related conditions (heart attack and disease, stroke, and kidney failure) in the southeastern U.S. COSEHC is achieving its mission by improving the awareness and knowledge of cardiovascular disease through education and by closing the gap in the translation of data into practical knowledge at many levels in the health care system. The cardiovascular clinical data collected through the COSEHC Database with the assistance of OnePartner will provide a very large prospective database which will be the basis for ongoing improvements in best practices and research in hypertension and cardiovascular disease.

Under the agreement, OnePartner will host the COSEHC Database hardware in the nation's first certified commercial Tier III data center, the Advanced Technology & Applications Center (ATAC) located in Duffield, Virginia. The security and high availability design of the ATAC is well suited for health care data such as the COSEHC database. The ATAC features 24x7x365 security and administrative staffing. Access to the building and server environment is tightly controlled with internal and external camera systems. Both biometric (fingerprint) and proximity cards are required to access the server areas. The one-of-a-kind ATAC is designed to support disaster recovery and business continuity, with redundant systems throughout.

The ATAC is certified by The Uptime Institute as a Tier III facility, providing ideal power, temperature, humidity and connectivity for computing environments. The ATAC is currently the only commercial data center ever certified at this level.

"The OnePartner ATAC in Duffield, Virginia is currently the sole U.S. Company providing outsourced commercial data center services (including colocation and disaster recovery) that has been awarded a Tier III Design Certification by the Uptime Institute."- Julian Kudritzki, Certification Manager, The Uptime Institute

OnePartner will develop interfaces between participating COSEHC Centers of Excellence and the COSEHC Database. Holston Medical Group, with over 250,000 active patients, is one of COSEHC's Centers of Excellence. Other Centers are located throughout the southeastern United States. These interfaces automate the data collection process, where data is transported from each Center securely using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL); the same protocols which protect financial transactions.

Under the agreement, each COSEHC Center of Excellence will have the opportunity to send clinical data to the COSEHC Database and to participate in OnePartner Research projects. The OnePartner Research initiative is a cooperative clinical research program designed to improve the quality and consistency of clinical research through advanced technology. OnePartner's vision is to improve the efficiency of clinical trial development, implementation and completion. This vision has attracted many other medical groups to participate with OnePartner. The COSEHC Centers of Excellence add even more medical practices to this effort. "COSEHC is committed to improving beyond the standards of care we see today." says Mr. Deaderick. "I've had the pleasure to work with several of these physicians and you just can't find better examples of the characteristics common to the best health care has to offer, highly intelligent, passionate about quality and committed to improving patient care outcomes".

At the recent 15th annual COSEHC Scientific Sessions in Baltimore, Dr. Moore, said "COSEHC is delighted to have the very best available security and data management for the COSEHC Database. The expertise and experience that OnePartner brings to our Database will help us improve cardiovascular care within the Southeast. Working together we can realistically see a day when there will be a true reduction in hypertension related morbidity and mortality in our region".