Independence Blue Cross adds online information for members
IFAwebnews
“Independence Blue Cross (IBC) is offering its members more personalized online information about their health, a move it says coincides with health reform’s passage.
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Articles
EHR at work at 2010 National Scout Jamboree
Johnathan Warner, Healthcare IT News
“The Boy Scouts of America, now celebrating their 100th anniversary this week, is now using wireless access and other forms of healthcare information technology for the first time at the 2010 National Scout Jamboree.
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Better health care with better IT, part 2: Implementation challenges
Ano Lobb, Justmeans
“The first posting in this series outlined how Kaiser Permanente has developed a registry of joint replacements as one approach to creating meaningful measures of health care outcomes.
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My Life in (with) Social Media – Blogterview of Wendy Sue Swanson, MD
Joshua Seidman, Health IT Buzz
“Donna Cryer, JD, ( @dcpatient ) said this to me last night (I’m paraphrasing): “When I see a physician on twitter, I always follow them because I want to hear their point of view.”
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Guiding Principles for Stage 1 Meaningful Use Adjustments
Joshua Seidman, Health IT Buzz
“The release of the CMS Medicare & Medicaid EHR Incentive Program Final Rule [link] on July 14 marked the end of the Stage 1 process for defining “meaningful use.” The final steps of that process involved reviewing, synthesizing, analyzing and reacting to more than 2,200 comments received from the public.
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Tracking the Evolution of HIEs
Mark Hagland, Healthcare Informatics
“Last week, the Washington, D.C.-based eHealth Initiative presented a one-day forum on the development of health information exchanges (HIEs). In conjunction with that event, held in Washington, D.C., the eHealth Initiative organization released the results of a nationwide survey of HIEs.
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How to Revive a Failed EHR Implementation
Paul Roemer, HealthSystemCIO
“The more I talk with hospital executives, the more convinced I am that one way to improve the quality and acceptance of the EHR is being overlooked.
A hospital EHR is an incredibly complex system, a system that has the possibility of interacting with almost every person who is walked or wheeled into the facility.
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Morecambe Bay admits problems with Lorenzo
Smart Healthcare
“Staff and patients have reported problems with the system, which went live at the start of June, ranging from not being able to access notes and staff having to stay behind for an extra two hours to put data into the system.
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Even when physicians adopt e-prescribing, use of advanced features lags
Grossman JM. Issue Brief, 133
Physician practice adoption of electronic prescribing has not guaranteed that individual physicians will routinely use the technology, particularly the more advanced features the federal government is promoting with financial incentives, according to a new national study from the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC). Slightly more than two in five physicians providing office-based ambulatory care reported that information technology (IT) was available in their practice to write prescriptions in 2008, the year before implementation of federal incentives. Among physicians with e-prescribing capabilities, about a quarter used the technology only occasionally or not at all.
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The impact of an integrated hospital-community medical information system on quality and service utilization in hospital departments
Nirel N et al, International journal of medical informatics, 2010
PURPOSE:
In 2005, an innovative system of hospital-community on-line medical records (OFEK) was implemented at Clalit Health Services (CHS). The goals of the study were to examine the extent of OFEK’s use and its impact on quality indicators and medical-service utilization in Internal Medicine and General Surgery wards of CHS hospitals.
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EHR changes are more than skin deep
Dana Blankenhorn, ZDNet Healthcare
“I had my regular check-up yesterday and my doctor had a surprise for me.
Their Electronic Health Record (EHR) is finally installed.
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Some views about SNOMED-CT by a General Practitioner
SNOMED- CT is is a concept-oriented and machine-readable medical terminology which has gained popularity this last ten years. It has been proposed as the reference terminology for use in electronic medical records and is supposed to cover the entire field needed to care and cure.
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Home telemonitoring and quality of life in stable, optimised chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
Lewis KE et al, J Telemed Telecare, 16(5)
We conducted a six-month randomised controlled trial of home telemonitoring for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). A total of 40 stable patients with moderate to severe COPD who had completed pulmonary rehabilitation took part. They were randomised to receive standard care (controls) or standard care plus home telemonitoring (intervention). During the monitoring period, patients in the telemonitoring group recorded their symptoms and physical observations twice daily. The data were transmitted automatically at night via the home telephone line.
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Transcultural telepsychiatry and its impact on patient satisfaction
Mucic D. et al, J Telemed Telecare, 16(5)
A telepsychiatry project was conducted to improve access to culturally appropriate care providers (i.e. culturally competent, bilingual clinicians) by the use of videoconferencing. A self-completed retrospective questionnaire survey was conducted with asylum seekers, refugees and migrants. The purpose of the referral was either for diagnostic assessment with a subsequent treatment recommendation, or for treatment via telepsychiatry. The service was free of charge for the patients involved. Over a period of 34 months (starting in January 2005), 61 patients participated in the pilot project.
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ICO issues guidance on SCR opt-outs
Fiona Barr, e-Health Insider Primary Care
“GPs must inform their patients before carrying out a blanket opt-out of all their patients from the Summary Care Record, the Information Commissioner’s Office has said.
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E-health records given the thumbs up
Julie Robotham, SMH
“Australians favour the idea of an electronic health record – with a significant minority even prepared to pay for it – according to a survey of 1200 people.
But patients and doctors are divided over how much control individuals should have over the contents of the record and whether they should be able to add to it themselves.
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Finally, an EMR worthy of a T-shirt
Paul Roemer, Healthcare IT Strategy
“Those who are regular readers know I’ve commented on more than one occasion that you never see anyone at the HIMSS convention walking around wearing a T-shirt imprinted with the slogan, “I love my EPIC”, or one stating, “McKesson forever”–unless they were talking about the implementation plan.
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The July HIT Standards Committee
John Halamka, Life as a Healthcare CIO
“The July HIT Standards Committee meeting focused on a review of the final Meaningful Use/Standards regulations and the processes for the next stage of our work.
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More on Telefónica’s telehealth and telecare ambitions
Telecare Aware
“As more information on Telefónica’s recent ‘global e-health’ announcement [here and here] is coming to light, the extent of its ambition to become the dominant e-health player in the countries in which it has networks is starting to sink in.
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Health IT Alone Won’t Improve Primary Care
Nicole Lewis, InformationWeek Healthcare
“Health information technology can be a strong facilitator for the establishment of the patient centered medical home (PCMH), but health IT alone is not a panacea for building an efficient model, a government study reveals.
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