McKesson accepts Department of Defense contract for RelayHelath

McKesson recently announced that it has been awarded a $139 million, five-year contract from the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Defense Health Agency (DHA) for its patient engagement and interoperable secure messaging solution, RelayHealth.

RelayHealth will serve patients, physicians, physician assistants, nurse care managers, physical therapists, occupational therapists, dentists and other care team members within the Military Health System (MHS). The system will provide better access to care for beneficiaries of the DoD, the coordination of advanced care teams in a wide variety of care settings and an enhancement of patient management -- with secure messaging, educational opportunities and tools that will help improve care management by providing access to data and members of the care team.

The DoD sees secure messaging as a vital tool that will provide the MHS a higher capacity that will help them meet the demand for care for the enrollees by supporting the delivery of virtual care. The DoD also sees secure messaging as a means to enable the delegation of tasks to health care providers who can handle them without having every message go to the physician level.