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MedcomSoft EMPOWERS FIGHT AGAINST BIO-TERRORISM

MedcomSoft announced it will make available a new high-tech tool in the fight against bio-terrorism and other chemical weapons of mass destruction that allows healthcare providers to quickly assess suspected cases of biological and chemical poisoning and track the progression of related symptoms and the outcome of prescribed therapies -- electronically -- across an entire patient population.

Developed with assistance from Medicomp Systems Inc of Virginia and prominent physicians from Harvard, Cornell and Johns Hopkins, this advanced version of the MedcomSoft Record will be available next week to healthcare professionals in high-risk areas to help in fast and accurate screening, rapid response and control management.

This version of MedcomSoft Record includes specially designed protocols of care that physicians can use to quickly evaluate patients with exposure to the majority of biological and chemical hazards. Biological agents that can be assessed and tracked include anthrax, botulism, plague, psittacosis, tularemia, q-fever, smallpox and various hemorrhagic fevers. Chemical agents include tabun, sarin, soman, Vx, mustard gas, lewisite, phosgene, chlorine, hydrogen cyanide and cyanogen chloride.

MedcomSoft Record goes several steps beyond assisting in rapid and structured assessment. It uses a state-of-the-art, built-in disease management system that can electronically track patients' symptoms over time, and their responses to prescribed therapies, to ensure care is maximized.

Since symptoms of certain forms of bio-chemical poisoning, such as anthrax, appear up to 60 days after exposure, careful monitoring of patients over time is paramount. No other software solution in the medical world can provide this unique brand of real-time, fine granularity clinical data that can be easily aggregated and analyzed by computers to provide accurate tracking for health facilities and regulatory bodies.

"America is facing a new kind of threat and we feel strongly that every tool should be mobilized in the fight against bio-terrorism," said Dr. Sami Aita, Chairman and CEO of MedcomSoft, "and the tool we have developed is extremely potent. Working co-operatively with some of America's leading scientists, we have been able to quickly customize our technology platform so it can be used to assess and effectively track the symptoms of a broad range of bio-chemical hazards across a patient population."

Since MedcomSoft Record is powered by one of the world's largest structured and codified medical vocabularies (Medcin), information on the various symptoms of these diseases was already embedded into the MedcomSoft system and linked numerically. MedcomSoft Record allows for easy and extensive data mining and flow sheeting and enables instantaneous trend analysis for health personnel who are tracking any attacks or outbreaks. This solution includes customizable protocols that will allow the quick addition of new work and environmental exposure risks -- such as the recent exposure risks posed to United States Postal Workers.

Since many bio-chemical threats have not been broadly faced previously by the medical community, the symptoms and assessment protocols are not always widely known to physicians. MedcomSoft Record puts this knowledge at the fingertips of all physicians -- creating a strong frontline defense against bio-chemical poisoning.

MedcomSoft Record's body of knowledge includes almost every type of medical finding -- with more than 72 million intelligent links to conditions -- allowing healthcare providers to build a comprehensive, structured and numerically codified patient medical record. Although the number of bio and chemical threats and their corresponding symptoms represent a small portion of the MedcomSoft Record complete database, this information may prove to be extremely valuable in the weeks and months ahead.

About MedcomSoft

MedcomSoft designs software solutions that are changing the way the healthcare industry captures, manages and exchanges patient information. Through its powerful suite of products, MedcomSoft provides important tools that enable healthcare professionals to fully automate their practices at the point of care and more efficiently and effectively connect with patients, researchers, pharmacies, medical suppliers, insurance and pharmaceutical companies. As a result of MedcomSoft innovations, physicians and managed care organizations can now: easily and securely build and exchange complete, structured, codified electronic patient medical records powered by one of the world's largest medical vocabularies. In addition, healthcare providers can now rapidly analyze all clinical and practice management data, for a patient or a population; build their own electronic protocols of care and dynamically connect these protocols to best practice guidelines and built-in clinical decision support systems. MedcomSoft's applications electronically track outcomes of care and trends in disease; reduce practice management costs; and, comply with emerging healthcare legislation. With a growing network of customers and resellers, and strong competitive advantages, MedcomSoft is positioned to play an important role in improving the quality and delivery of patient care worldwide.

MedcomSoft has offices in Saratoga Springs, New York, USA, Buffalo, New York, USA, Sydney, Australia and Toronto, Canada.