Health Data Management articles from October 2008

Health Data Management archives from October 2008

On Stereotypes and Mandates.
October 1, 2008... One of the more enduring health care I.T. myths is that of the physician Luddite. Physicians, so it goes, are dead set against new documentation tools, such as the electronic health record. Even worse are "older physicians," one of those murky...

Software vendors should give better financial incentives to providers and payers acting as beta sites.
October 1, 2008... AGREE Vince Ciotti Principal HIS Professionals LLC, Santa Fe, N.M. "More than a discount, vendors should PAY pilot sites for putting their facilities' financial health (and possibly their patients' health) at risk during such...

Massachusetts' Move Raises Questions.
October 1, 2008... Massachusetts' major hospital and physician associations are taking a wait-and-see attitude on the state's new mandate on health care organizations to implement interoperable electronic health records systems by October 2015 as a condition of...

Industry Gets the Call for ICD-10, HIPAA.
October 1, 2008... While the Bush Administration in mid-August proposed new rules to adopt the ICD-10 diagnostic code sets and version 5010 of the HIPAA electronic transactions, don't expect to see the final rules before the new administration takes office,...

What the candidates say about health I.T.
October 1, 2008... How would the health information technology policies under a McCain or Obama administration differ from the government's current policies? The candidates' speeches and policy papers on health care give some hints, but neither camp sheds...

Minn. Gov: Give Access to PHRs, HRAs.
October 1, 2008... Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty (R) has proposed offering a free personal health record to every resident of the state by 2011. Initially, his administration intends to offer a PHR to each of the state's 50,000 employees in 2009. The PHR...

Network to Research Outcomes.
October 1, 2008... The eHealth Initiative, an industry advocacy consortium, will team with the Joseph H. Kanter Family Foundation in Miami to spearhead development of an electronic network to assess the clinical effectiveness of various treatments. The...

Trinity's I.T. Program Hits Iowa.
October 1, 2008... Three rural hospitals in Iowa have implemented electronic health records software from Cerner Corp., Kansas City, Mo. The hospitals-Kossuth Regional Health Center in Algona, Franklin General Hospital in Hampton and Mitchell County Regional...

New PHR, E-Script Efforts for Medicare.
October 1, 2008... The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will expand personal health records pilot programs for Medicare beneficiaries. CMS also will host an educational conference on a recently enacted Medicare e-prescribing incentive payment program...

Safety data formats issued.(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... The federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has released a set of common definitions and reporting formats for provider organizations that voluntarily report patient safety data to patient safety organizations. Use of the Common...

JCAHO Wants Diversity-Friendly Rules.
October 1, 2008... The Joint Commission will revise and develop accreditation standards for hospitals to incorporate diversity, cultural, language and health literacy issues into patient care processes. The Oakbrook Terrace, Ill.-based commission likely will not...

Group to accredit data exchanges.(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... The Electronic Healthcare Network Accreditation Commission has started developing an accreditation program for health information exchanges, regional health information organizations and other community-based networking partnerships. EHNAC is...

Insurance Covers Data Breach Costs.
October 1, 2008... Members of the San Diego-based Premier Inc. purchasing alliance now can sign up for insurance to protect them against the expenses related to data breaches. A unit of the alliance, Premier Insurance Management Services, Charlotte, N.C., is...

Federal Tool Assesses Disaster Drills.
October 1, 2008... The federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has released software to help hospitals evaluate their disaster drills. The new Tool for Evaluating Core Elements of Hospital Disaster Drills is an abridged version of a more comprehensive...

England's I.T. push gets new leaders.(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... The Department of Health in England has its first CIO and a new leader for the National Health Services' Connecting for Health program. The initiative seeks to implement clinical information systems across the nation. Martin Bellamy is the new...

Report Studies I.T. Work Force Issues.(Report)
October 1, 2008... A new report from Computer Sciences Corp. examines challenges that health care CIOs face with a multi-generational workforce. The information technology department in a health care organization can have employees from four different...

GAO: work remains on VA, DoD Links.(Government Accountability Office, Veterans Affairs, Departments of Defense)(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... The Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs still have a long road ahead in efforts to share patient data among their information systems, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. The GAO is an investigatory arm...

Athenahealth Makes Its First Buy.
October 1, 2008... Physician software and outsourced billing vendor athenahealth Inc. has acquired Crest Line Technologies, which sells patient messaging services. Watertown, Mass.-based athenahealth paid $7.7 million-part of which will be paid after meeting...

High stakes, difficult choices: physician groups embracing EHRs face a plethora of options. Some adopters share their top priorities.
October 1, 2008... Long choked with paper, and burdened with workflows that they don't fully understand, physicians in group practices have good reason to embrace electronic health records and integrated practice management systems. No wonder they may think of...

Preparing for Medicare Audits: Hospitals are using information technology in hopes of minimizing the financial impact of the new RAC program.
October 1, 2008... When a financial audit is inevitable, often the best way to prepare is with a self-audit. That's the approach University of Texas Health Center-Tyler is taking to get ready for the inescapable Medicare Recovery Audit Contractor program. A...

A Guide To The RAC Program.
October 1, 2008... The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services planned to select four independent contractors to run the new national Medicare Recovery Audit Contractor program in September. The RAC program will be phased in state-by-state starting in the...

Survey Identifies Hospitals' RAC Preparations.
October 1, 2008... Eighty-one percent of health information management directors at hospitals say their organizations have taken steps to improve claims accuracy to prepare for the Medicare Recovery Audit Contractor program, a new survey shows. Nevertheless, the...

Command Performance: Electronic records are a critical first step in pay-for-performance incentive programs.
October 1, 2008... When you want to know how to win, it's best to seek advice from a winner. Of the 260 hospitals participating in Medicare's Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration project, 623-bed Sacred Heart Medical Center received this year's highest...

A Small Health Plan Takes Big P4P Steps.
October 1, 2008... Although it's a relatively small payer, with about 250,000 covered lives, not-for-profit Geisinger Health Plan has a mature pay-for-performance program supported by information technology. The Danville, Pa.-based HMO posts quality scores...

McKesson Looks Overseas: Four small, add-on acquisitions in the first half of 2008 bring new functions to products from McKesson Technology Solutions.(Report)
October 1, 2008... In the past, acquisitions have been a strategy McKesson uses to fill product holes and quickly meet client needs. Other strategic initiatives this year, such as a major enhancement of its revenue cycle management services for hospitals and a...

Finding a Needle in a Haystack: Montefiore digs into data to support research on best practices.
October 1, 2008... Some might call it "data mining on steroids." But the organizer of an ambitious research project at Montefiore Medical Center in New York describes it as "asking clinically cogent questions of ragged data while respecting the need for user...

EHR Face-Off: What's Easy, Hard: A Kaiser physician shares her practice's lessons.
October 1, 2008... Four years after work began, Kaiser Permanente announced in May the completion of a national rollout of electronic health records systems across ambulatory facilities. The milestone is part of Kaisers initiative to adopt a wide range of...

Blogs Reveal Voice of the People: Payers test the waters of online patient commentary.
October 1, 2008... Needing a mammogram, a software developer went to Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis with great expectations. She was looking forward to being the beneficiary of the latest in digital mammography. The imaging technology proved to be...

Voice of the people.(Brief article)
October 1, 2008... Here are some excerpts from the Health Care Scoop, an online patient blog site from Consumer Aware, an affiliate of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota. Human being, not a "mammo"!! After filling out the initial forms I was made to...

An integrated approach: I.T. planning must not happen in a vacuum.
October 1, 2008... Information technology has enabled the success of hospitals by providing a core infrastructure through a separate supportive process. But the most successful health systems have truly integrated I.T. with all other strategies and tactics to...