Southwest Kidney Institute Selects Full Suite of athenahealth Services

--Leading kidney disease management group to leverage web-based services from athenahealth to drive better operational outcomes and patient care

--Selection supports successful partnership between athenahealth and DaVita to support nephrology physician market

PHOENIX & WATERTOWN, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--athenahealth, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATHN), a leading provider of web-based practice management, electronic health record (EHR), and patient communication services to medical groups, today announced that Southwest Kidney Institute, PLC, one of the nation’s leading kidney disease management groups, has selected athenahealth’s full suite of web-based services to help its 50 medical providers streamline operational procedures and to support improved communications with patients that will enable the delivery of better, more coordinated patient care.

Southwest Kidney Institute’s dialysis centers and programs are designed to deliver dialysis services and education to patients with chronic kidney failure and end-stage renal disease. In January of 2008, Southwest Kidney Institute partnered with DaVita (NYSE: DVA), an expert in dialysis management in the United States, with the intention of allowing the company to focus more on patient care. Southwest Kidney Institute selected athenahealth’s services in an effort to drive better operational and clinical outcomes for their nephrology physician practices. athenahealth announced a partnership with DaVita in March 2010 to market its services to nephrologists across the country.

Southwest Kidney Institute will adopt athenaCommunicator^SM, a patient cycle management tool designed to manage patient interactions triggered by practice staff or by automated routines within athenaNet®, athenahealth’s web-based platform. This will present the group with expanded accessibility for patients after-hours and on weekends, improved self-pay revenue stream, re-captured staff and physician time, reduced no-shows, as well as elimination of expensive paper-based mailing campaigns.

athenaCommunicator will work seamlessly with athenaCollector^®, athenahealth’s web-based medical billing and practice management service, which is fully integrated with athenahealth’s electronic health record (EHR) service, athenaClinicals^SM. Combined, these three services will provide Southwest Kidney Institute with a single, unified practice management platform that will help to improve their practice and patient communications across a number of fronts.

“When we decided it was time to upgrade our practice management capabilities and current EHR system, we researched a number of companies in the market. After seeing how athenahealth is able to harness the power of the Internet into a flexible solution that meets a number of our needs, we looked no further,” said Pam Young, Chief Administrative Officer for Southwest Kidney Institute. “athenahealth is able to offer us services to support our practice from a billing and health record standpoint, as well as the ability to better communicate with our patients 24/7. We believe this will greatly improve the level of care and attention we can provide to our many patients. Knowing that we have a trusted business partner in athenahealth improves our ability to focus on what matters most: patient care.”

Jonathan Bush, Chairman and CEO of athenahealth, commented, “Like many providers of health care, Southwest Kidney Institute experienced unfortunate limitations with legacy software solutions that are siloed and require new installations with every update. Such software requires burdensome investments and hours and hours of training to keep pace with changes in the industry. Our Internet-based offering is updated automatically, growing more intelligent with every instance of use, and it requires minimal upfront investment of time and dollars. As a result, we are confident that Southwest Kidney Institute will be able to manage their business more effectively and, in turn, focus more energy on caring for patients.”

About Southwest Kidney Institute

Southwest Kidney Institute, PLC is one of the nation’s industry-leading kidney disease prevention and management companies providing comprehensive care to patients with kidney disease. Southwest Kidney Institute offers a patient-focused care model that manages patients from the early stages of kidney disease through transplant or dialysis. The nephrologists direct all aspects of kidney disease management ensuring the highest quality of care.

About DaVita Inc.

DaVita Inc., a Fortune 500® company, is a leading provider of kidney care in the United States, delivering dialysis services and education to patients with chronic kidney failure and end stage renal disease. As of June 30, 2010, DaVita operated or provided administrative services at 1,582 outpatient dialysis facilities, serving approximately 122,000 patients. DaVita develops, participates in and donates to numerous programs dedicated to transforming communities and creating positive, sustainable change for children, families and our environment. The company’s leadership development initiatives and corporate social responsibility efforts have been recognized by Fortune, Modern Healthcare, Newsweek and WorldBlu, among others. For more information, please visit www.davita.com.

About athenahealth

athenahealth, Inc. is a leading provider of Internet-based business services for physician practices. athenahealth’s service offerings are based on proprietary web-native practice management and electronic health record (EHR) software, a continuously updated payer knowledge-base, integrated back-office service operations, and automated and live patient communication services. For more information, please visit www.athenahealth.com or call [phone].

This press release contains forward-looking statements, which are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including statements regarding the anticipated benefits of athenahealth’s service offerings. These statements are neither promises nor guarantees, and are subject to a variety of risks and uncertainties, many of which are beyond our control, which could cause actual results to differ materially from those contemplated in these forward-looking statements. In particular, the risks and uncertainties include, among other things: the risk that our service offerings will not operate in the manner that we expect, due to design flaws, security breaches, or otherwise; potential interruptions or delays in our internet-based service offerings; our reliance upon third parties, such as computer hardware, software, data-hosting, and internet infrastructure providers, which reliance may result in failures or disruptions in our service offerings; errors or omissions included in our payer and clinical intelligence rules engine and database; and the evolving and complex government regulatory compliance environment in which we and our clients operate. Existing and prospective investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on these forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date hereof. athenahealth undertakes no obligation to update or revise the information contained in this press release, whether as a result of new information, future events or circumstances, or otherwise. For additional disclosure regarding these and other risks faced by athenahealth, please see the disclosure contained in our public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, available on the Investors section of our website at http://www.athenahealth.com and on the SEC’s website at http://www.sec.gov.