Health Data Management articles from December 2007

Health Data Management archives from December 2007

Issue Date Issue.
December 1, 2007... December 2007

A Look Ahead to 2008.
December 1, 2007... This year was an eventful one for Health Data Management as we underwent two major projects: redesigning our print edition and completely overhauling our Web site. We can't check off "done" on the Web site, and likely never will. We'll...

Editorial/Ad Index.
December 1, 2007... A Advanced Medical Technology Association 8 American Health Information Management Association 16 Availity LLC 60 B Barrett, Bob, Memorial Health System 36 Bauer, Jeffrey C., ACS Healthcare Solutions 16 Bend...

The Benefits Of Pay-For-Performance Programs Are Worth The Cost And Hassles To Provider Organizations To Participate. Agree or Disagee?(Survey)
December 1, 2007... Online Survey Results Disagree 57% Agree 43% Source: Health Data Management Web site, www.healthdatamanagement.com, October 2007 survey results. 780 responses AGREE Antonio Linares Vice President/Medical Director...

Doctors Worried About Hardware's Infection Risks.
December 1, 2007... The perceived risk of infections from using mobile computing devices is a barrier that must be overcome before more doctors will use the hardware, a new study based on interviews with about 100 physicians concludes. Sixty-five percent of...

Nursing I.T. Award Nominations Sought.
December 1, 2007... Health Data Management is accepting nominations for its third annual Nursing Information Technology Innovation Award. The deadline for entries is Jan. 8, 2008. The award will be presented to a team of nursing professionals at a U.S. health...

Misys Announces Second Grant Recipient.
December 1, 2007... Misys Healthcare Systems has announced the Tampa Bay, Fla. area will be the second recipient of its Center for Community Health Leadership Grant program. The Raleigh, N.C.-based vendor will donate $3 million worth of its electronic health...

HDM Announces Awards Nominees.
December 1, 2007... Health Data Management has announced the nominees for the first annual Editors Choice Awards with the winner being announced at the 3rd Annual World Healthcare Innovation and Technology Congress (WHIT 3.0), Dec. 9-11 in Washington. The award,...

CMS Readies Large EHR Demo.
December 1, 2007... The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services soon will launch a large-scale effort to document the benefits of physicians using electronic health records. "The time is finally right for us to make a game-changing move," said CMS acting...

CSC to Buy First Consulting.
December 1, 2007... Computer Sciences Corp., which provides information technology software and services to clients in multiple industries, will expand its health care business by acquiring First Consulting Group Inc. El Segundo, Calif.-based CSC will pay $13 per...

Futurist: I.T. Key to Productivity.
December 1, 2007... A futurist who contends that U.S. health care spending will soon reach its peak as a percentage of the gross domestic product says information technology is the key to making health care more productive. "We have to turn to information...

Report Looks at State Roles for HIE.(Health Information Exchange )(Report)(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... The health care industry needs standards for accrediting the governance structure and technical operations of regional health information organizations and health information exchanges, according to a preliminary report funded by the federal...

'Blueprint' Offers I.T. Guidance.(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... A coalition of 200 organizations has issued a 107-page report addressing how to use information technology to improve health care. The e-Health Initiative, a Washington-based group, published its "blueprint" on "building consensus for common...

Online Physician Communities Launched.(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... Two new Web-based communities designed for physicians have gone live. Vemics Inc., a New York-based Web portal vendor, launched iMedicor, a free, secure health data exchange portal. The site is designed to enable registered physicians to...

Report Assesses Home Monitoring.(Report)(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... A new report from the Advanced Medical Technology Association in Washington describes the benefits of remote patient monitoring technology in the home but acknowledges challenges to widespread use of the technology. Using in-home patient...

The MGMA News Round-Up.
December 1, 2007... Editor's Note: Following are highlights of Health Data Management's news coverage at the 2007 Medical Group Management Association Conference, held Oct. 26-29 in Philadelphia. For expanded versions of these stories, plus much more coverage,...

Newsline Digest.
December 1, 2007... Newsline Digest presents highlights of the latest health care I.T. news as reported on the Health Data Management Web site. For extended versions of these and many other original news stories, visit www.healthdatamanagement.com. SURVEY...

Stock Chart.(Statistical table)
December 1, 2007... Health Care Technology Companies, as of November 1, 2007 Price Price as a One Six One Mkt Company on % of 52 month month year YTD Cap name Ticker...

Mobile Tech One app... ...at a time: Hospital executives are choosing mobile hardware and software to automate one process at a time.
December 1, 2007... Executives at Columbia, Md.-based Howard County General Hospital used a variety of criteria to select a wireless bedside specimen collection system last year. They spent several months evaluating the cost, functionality and other customer...

Converged network offers more options.
December 1, 2007... Memorial Health System has cobbled together various wireless hardware and software across its 100-year-old main facility. But when the Colorado Springs, Colo.-based delivery system broke ground on a second hospital, I.T. leaders wanted to...

Formal ROI Analysis Is Rare: Very few organizations complete a formal benchmarking and measurement process for their software investments. But experts say they should.
December 1, 2007... When El Centro (Calif.) Regional Medical Center contemplated investing in an emergency department information system, the hospital's chief nursing officer and other executives demanded a precise quantification of the potential return on...

Sometimes, ROI is a Personal Matter.
December 1, 2007... Experts advise health care organizations to carefully measure the return on investment in software. But for some doctors, the measure that really matters is the effect on their lifestyle. "I'm not a stereotypical, overworked, frazzled...

A New Application for Biometrics: Organizations experiment with new identification systems for patients.
December 1, 2007... Carolinas HealthCare System, with 19 hospitals and 150 clinics, is a sprawling enterprise that needed to improve its processes for quickly and positively identifying patients, and linking them to the correct electronic health record. The...

Using Fingerprints To Identify Clinicians.
December 1, 2007... The most common use of biometrics in health care is the application of fingerprint scanning for identifying clinicians accessing information systems. For example, caregivers at Sutter Solano Medical Center, Vallejo, Calif., have been using...

An Early Adopter's Tale Of Woe.
December 1, 2007... Taking a risk on a first-generation technology can backfire. Executives at Eagleville (Pa.) Hospital learned this the hard way when they attempted to use iris scanning to regulate access to the organizations computer network. Iris scanning...

Vendor Powers Up Following IPO: Flush from a $130 million initial public offering, from which it received $90 million, athenahealth Inc. has retired $30 million in debt and has the rest in the bank.
December 1, 2007... Now, the Watertown, Mass.-based company has to show its service won't falter as a public company, says Jonathan Bush, president and CEO. Since 2000, the vendor has made its name by offering remotely hosted practice management software...

New Standardization Effort Targets Test Results: Hospitals and physicians are testing uniform terms to describe lab and imaging results.
December 1, 2007... As communities implement regional health information organizations, they need to make sure that all physicians have access to standard laboratory and diagnostic imaging results. That's because a lack of uniform data could cause serious...

Getting Paid What You Deserve: A clinic uses specialized software to make sure insurers are paying what they are contractually obligated to pay.
December 1, 2007... Some group practices are finding that with a little extra effort, and the help of specialized software, they can get paid a lot more by insurers. Just ask Bend (Ore.) Memorial Clinic. The 80-physician, three-site practice is recouping an...

Using Claims Data to Make a change: Four Blues plans hope easy access to information helps physicians provide better care.
December 1, 2007... Health Care Service Corp. believes the information contained in claims is powerful. The payer, which runs the Blue Cross/Blue Shield plans in Illinois, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas, is using claims data to provide medical history summaries to...

Stats Snapshot.(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... Increased pressure from government agencies and the satisfaction of patients and providers are increasingly important factors driving group practices to install electronic records, according to the Medical Record Institute's Ninth Annual Survey...

Electronic Health Records: Maybe a matter of life and death: The Louisiana HIE may help providers in the face of another disaster.
December 1, 2007... On Monday, Aug. 29, 2005, Katrina overwhelmed New Orleans' hurricane protection structures, exposing the city to the waters of Lake Pontchartrain and the Gulf of Mexico. By mid-week, 80% of New Orleans was under feet of water and would remain...

Editor's Notes: Find the Technology You Need.(www.healthdatamanagement.com.)(Brief article)
December 1, 2007... Health Data Management is pleased to bring you the 14th annual edition of our Marketplace edition, formerly known as the Resource Guide. The Marketplace includes detailed information on hundreds of leading information technology companies....

Complete Index to Articles for 2007.
December 1, 2007... Corporate Strategy Vendor Consolidation: Still Riding the Wave. Goedert, Joe, January: 56. Canadian Firm to Acquire Kodak Health. Goedert, Joe, February: 22. Fuji Buy into Hot Cardiac PACS Market. Goedert, Joe, February: 22. ...

Health care I.T. Conferences 2008.
December 1, 2007... January 17-18: National Health Benefits Conference & Expo Tampa, Fla. www.hbce.com 30-01: Medicine Meets Virtual Reality, Aligned Management Associates Inc. Long Beach, Calif. www.nextmed.com February 24: Spring CIO...