Understanding end users' perspectives towards health information exchange (HIE) technology is crucial to the long-term success of HIE, according to researchers from Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville, Tenn., who developed an in-depth understanding of HIE usage by applying qualitative methods.
Claudia Williams, MS, director of the Office of the National Coordinator for Health IT’s (ONC) state health information exchange (HIE) program, offered a review of the ONC’s progress on HIE and its primary goals for 2012 during the National eHealth Collaborative's webinar on “ONC’s National HIE Strategy.”
Widespread hospital support for health information exchange (HIE) and initial deployment only in emergency department (ED) settings can lower overall societal costs and reduce hospital admissions, according to a study published in the May edition of the
Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association .
Quality improvement and patient-centered care—two concepts essential to the health reform effort—will require health IT. Current and future physicians must master the minimal competencies required to use health IT if the healthcare system is to reach its quality and cost containment goals, according to an article in the March edition of
Health Affairs.
By leaving out ineligible providers in reform efforts, the nation risks building a new digital divide where key providers, who already have low levels of electronic clinical data, may fall further behind, according to an article published in the March edition of
Health Affairs.
National Coordinator for Health IT Farzad Mostashari, MD, told one of his predecessors, David J. Brailer, MD, that health IT is “on the move” and quantitative outcomes are on the way in the U.S. in an interview published in the March issue of
Health Affairs.
The data-rich clinical informatics programs necessary for outcomes-based reimbursement reform have been made possible by massive federal investments in health IT and while healthcare organizations have made progress, numerous challenges remain and there is room for improvement, according to research conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
Although well-intentioned and in response to pressure from healthcare providers, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ decision to delay the implementation deadline could have negative consequences according to a survey of healthcare professionals involved in their organization’s ICD-10 initiatives.
The National Cancer Institute is partnering with Health Level Seven, the Ann Arbor, Mich.-based nonprofit standards developer, to package clinical trial data using HL7 Clinical Data Architecture (CDA), allowing the information to be made available in patient EHRs
Seventy-three percent of respondents to National eHealth Collaborative’s 2012 Stakeholder Survey stated that better care coordination is one of the most important benefits of health information exchange (HIE).
LAS VEGAS—Despite proclamations that 2012 marks the end of the world, William Morgan, MBA, senior regional information management executive for Christus Spohn Health System in Corpus Christi, Texas, said that while there are numerous challenges to health IT, there also are solutions. Morgan spoke during the 2012 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference on Feb. 22.
LAS VEGAS—Providers should consider a physician alignment model via health IT instead of an acquisition model, but better methods are needed to improve patient safety and maximize reimbursements, according to a Feb. 22 presentation at the 2012 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference. Regardless, a one-size fits-all strategy is no longer reasonable, the presenter suggested.
LAS VEGAS—Mobile systems can allow for on-the-go availability, instant log-in, no required desk space or less time spent waiting for a shared computer, off-site use and the ability of physicians to use their own mobile devices, as well as greater acceptance of EHRs, Afzal ur Rehman, MD, PhD, CMIO, and Rebecca Kennis, clinical systems analyst at United Health Services, explained to a packed house Feb. 21 at the 2012 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference.
LAS VEGAS—“As someone co-leading ICD-10 implementation for a huge company, last week was an interesting week,” said Rob Alger, vice president, health plan business technology solutions and services, Kaiser Permanente. He was speaking of the announcement that the Department of Health and Human Services will delay the required ICD-10 implementation deadline during the Physician IT Symposium on Feb. 20 at the 2012 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference.
LAS VEGAS—Image-enabled personal health records (PHRs), the cornerstone of an IHE-based image sharing network, have leveraged the cross-enterprise document sharing (XDS) profile to engage consumers, David S. Mendelson, MD, chief of clinical informatics at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City, said during a Feb. 22 session at the 2012 Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference. The PHR model mimics (and could augment) the CD-based image exchange model.
As EHR adoption rates tick upwards, sending notes via the EHR is becoming a viable means of communicating clinician-to-clinician. Requiring electronic signatures to prove receipt of notes is becoming a viable means of ensuring communication, but large amounts of additional signature required (ASR) alerts on EHRs could be a burden for providers, according to research published February in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Transaction standards were first written into HIPAA legislation in 2000 to create standardized routes for healthcare organizations to exchange financial and administrative data, but they left too much room for interpretation and the result has been chaotic, according to a Jan. 17 article in the Journal of the American Health Information Management Association.
The increasing utilization of EHRs and health information exchange (HIE) that has been spurred by an unprecedented level of government funding for health IT could represent an untapped market for both job creation and market savings, according to the eHealth Initiative (eHI).
Although most of California’s community pharmacies are able to receive electronic prescriptions, only 25 percent of the state’s physicians are currently electronically prescribing medications and just 16 percent of the state’s total prescriptions are routed electronically, according to Cal eConnect.
Although the requirements for Stage 2 of meaningful use are not yet final, IT services firm CSC said the direction is clear and healthcare organizations should focus on providing capabilities for engaging patients, coordinating care and capturing the data for quality reporting.
