Sydney, July 24, 2008 (ABN Newswire) - iSOFT (LON:IOT) Spain, a subsidiary of the IBA Health Group Limited (ASX:IBA)(PINK:IBATF) today announced that it had been awarded a $1.15 million (EURO698,000) contract with the Nuevo Leon Healthcare State Department in Mexico for an integrated care system at ten hospitals and 470 health centres.

The contract is believed to be Mexico's first regional level healthcare IT project. It follows the implementation of iSOFT's hospital information system (HIS) at the Women and Children's Hospital in Monterrey, the state capital, last year.

iSOFT's HIS is now being installed at the remaining nine hospitals across the state and its primary care solution installed at the health centres. With its local partner MCS, a Monterrey based telecommunications company, iSOFT is providing an integrated, state-wide healthcare system to improve services and the quality of healthcare for a state population of over 4 million people.

The project is due for completion by December this year and is drawing huge interest from other states in Mexico. iSOFT has also become the first company with a HIS solution that is compatible with the SIGHO HIS developed by the Sinaloa University in Culiacan, which will form the backbone of Mexico's Connecting Healthcare Record Project, the country's future national health IT program.

Gary Cohen, IBA's Executive Chairman and CEO, said: "We are the only company in Mexico providing hospital information systems that are compatible and interoperable with state and national requirements.

There is a vast opportunity for iSOFT in Mexico and Latin America through our Spanish based products developed in our regional centre of excellence in Malaga, Spain Mexico alone has 100,000 health centres including 4,200 public and private hospitals," concluded Mr Cohen.