Expanding on a partnership announced this past spring, athenahealth and Henry Schein will integrate their respective technologies to better enable community health centers to meet reporting requirements.

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The project will see athenahealth's athenaNet platform integrated with Henry Schein's Dentrix Enterprise electronic dental record, meant to facilitate Uniform Data System reporting, a requirement for CHCs, including federally qualified health centers, or FQHCs. 

Officials say the integration of the athenaNet and Dentrix Enterprise platforms will automate the UDS reporting process, ensuring accurate, complete UDS reports, without the need for manual and time-consuming reconciliation between separate systems.

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"Value-based care models, like the FQHC model, require substantial documentation and reporting; our goal is to automate these processes wherever possible to save valuable time and reduce cost for our clients," said athenahealth chairman and CEO Jonathan Bush in a press statement.

Through this partnership, "we are enabling our CHC and FQHC clients to work smarter and more efficiently as they pursue quality care, better health and lower costs for their patients," he said.

"Dentrix Enterprise already integrates with many medical EHR vendors through HL7 interface," added Kevin Bunker, President, Henry Schein North America Dental Practice Solutions, in a prepared statement. "Our integration with athenahealth will provide CHC and FQHC customers with significant value through a more seamless exchange of information for customers that use both systems."

A pilot program to create standard documentation and efficient processes will be undertaken by Pennsylvania-based Family First Health and Maryland-based Three Lower Counties Community Services.

"Managing the reporting demands as an FQHC can be a complex and time-consuming process," said Jenni Black, chief information officer, Family First Health, in a statement. "This effort is not only going to result in a substantial cost savings for our practice, but also will enable us to put more of our valuable resources toward patient care, where we can truly make a difference in our community."

"The pairing of athenaNet and Dentrix Enterprise is a positive step for FQHCs like ours, that are looking to find ways to streamline processes and reduce unnecessary work," added Susanne Gray, RN, CEO and chief operations officer of Three Lower Countries Community Services.