Health Data Management articles from February 2002

Health Data Management archives from February 2002

Publisher's Letter.
February 1, 2002... Reading this month's cover story on the identifier rules of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act made me a bit nostalgic. You see, this issue marks the conclusion of our ninth year of publishing Health Data Management. And...

Is the Speech Recognition Market Finally Ready for Growth?
February 1, 2002... Three years ago, Chestnut Hill Hospital in Philadelphia paid $110,000 for speech recognition software. Five radiologists now use the software to dictate their observations and create immediate reports for attending physicians. The software...

Indy Hospital Expands Commitment to Hand-helds.
February 1, 2002... While many in health care today fawn over hand-held computers, Jeffrey Bowman, M.D., remembers using the tiny devices more than seven years ago. As a resident at St. Vincent Indianapolis Hospital, he and others used hand-helds for basic...

Health Care I.T. Stocks Left Behind as Markets Roar.
February 1, 2002... Investors were exuberant in the fourth quarter of 2001. However, while they were excited about the broader technology sector they were unmoved by health care I.T. stocks. The price of a marketbasket of 28 health care I.T. stocks tracked by...

Newsline Digest.
February 1, 2002... The following are based on stories featured on the Health Data Management Web site. For twice-daily news bulletins every Monday through Friday, visit www.healthdatamanagement.com. Bush Signs HIPAA Delay into Law President Bush on Dec...

Newsline Briefs.
February 1, 2002... Marketing Agreements * HEALTHvision, an application service provider, will use Continuity Version-4 content management software from Cytura Corp., Heathrow, Fla., to implement its Web-based services. The agreement is designed to enable...

Health Care I.T. Stock Chart.
February 1, 2002... Price Price as One on a % of 52 month Health care software companies 1/11/0 Wk High Change Allscripts Healthcare Solutions MDRX $3.20 ...

When Disaster Strikes: After lightning and fire destroy a clinic, staff members use an ASP system to immediately regain access to data.
February 1, 2002... The last thing Dara Tredwell had on her mind when she bought a new practice management system in October 2000 was how she could access data in an emergency. Tredwell, office manager at Jonesboro (Ga.) Pediatric Clinic, chose a system that...

Ticking Clock Unites Rivals: Regional providers and payers find HIPAA deadlines a good motivation for cooperating on implementation issues.
February 1, 2002... Nearly a decade ago, health care provider and payer organizations in many regions of the nation formed community health information networks to facilitate adoption of standard, electronic administrative transactions. Most of these CHINs failed...

Electronic Stepping Stones: A multi-specialty group practice finds an incremental approach to electronic medical records fits its financial and cultural climate.
February 1, 2002... For Skagit Valley Medical Center, acquiring an electronic medical records system requires equal parts technology, psychology and patience. The 55-physician multi-specialty group practice in Mount Vernon, Wash., is taking a step-by-step...

The HIPAA Identifier Rules.
February 1, 2002... While the transactions and code sets, privacy, and security rules hog the spotlight, HIPAA's four identifier rules are waiting in the wings. Their impending debut, however, requires CIOs' attention sooner rather than later. Since the...

Preparing for ID rules requires varying strategies.
February 1, 2002... PreferredOne, a Golden Valley, Minn.-based payer organization, has spent the last eight months reducing the number of proprietary provider identifiers in its database. This consolidation will make it easier for PreferredOne to cross...

No action on individual ID.
February 1, 2002... Development of an individual, or patient, identifier rule-mandated by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act-has been suspended indefinitely. Shortly after plans for an individual identifier rule were announced, there was...

Paper Documents Get Sharper Image: Health care organizations are using document management systems in innovative ways to process clinical and financial data.
February 1, 2002... In November 1999, staff members at Nephrology Associates of Kentuckiana concluded their filing process needed to be fixed. Paper documents were coming into the business office faster than staff could file them. To solve this problem, the...

Clinical Trials Getting A Hand: Organizations involved in clinical trials are using hand-held technology to increase the speed and quality of data reporting.
February 1, 2002... Admitting stroke patients at the emergency department at Erlanger Medical Center triggers a chain of events. First and foremost, caregivers are assessing stroke symptoms to quickly decide treatment options. At virtually the same time, however,...

Technology extends the reach of clinical trials.
February 1, 2002... Recent advances in information technology are having a dramatic effect on the gathering, storing and exchanging of data in health care. That progress is especially evident in conducting clinical trials. In the past two years, information...

No License To Steal: CIOs devise ways to eliminate unlicensed software, a nagging problem with potentially major consequences.
February 1, 2002... Getting software to run smoothly across computer networks often is a big challenge for health care CIOs. Making sure they're paying for the software makes the job even tougher. CIOs-unlike many other health care employees-know software is...

Contracts Update.
February 1, 2002... The Contracts Update section includes announcements of contracts that health care information technology companies have signed with customers in recent weeks. Contract news can be sent to Health Data Management via facsimile to (312) 913-1959...

Readers' Perspectives.
February 1, 2002... Q. "Most health care CIOs have adequate disaster recovery plans in place for protecting data and getting information systems up and running in emergency situations. Do you agree or disagree?" Wade Williams, Director of Information Systems...