Computer Sciences Corporation announced this morning that it will acquire First Consulting Group for $365 million in cash, subject to shareholder and regulatory approval.
“By taking this step, we have notably accelerated our healthcare business plan and advanced toward our goal of transforming healthcare through the use of information technology,” said Russ Owen, president of CSC’s Americas Commercial Group. “The CSC-First Consulting Group combination reinforces our commitment to bring innovative solutions to healthcare payer, provider and life sciences clients and offers increased flexibility in our global healthcare service delivery capability.”
From Dr. Lisa Cutty: “Re: Microsoft. Microsoft to Acquire Innovative Healthcare Technology and Assets From Global Care Solutions. Does MS really want to enter the battled HIS arena?” Link. MSFT buys the application developer that built systems for big-name medical tourism magnet Bumrungrad International Hospital. For the dirt on the company, see here from alleged employees, and a few more comments here including some shots at Cerner and others. I don’t know why Microsoft wants to be in this business either, although maybe Azyxxi needs a little brother.
From Big Fan: “Re: first mover advantage. Check out Bruce Freidman’s column from the weekend. Great insight. He’s also from University of Michigan, the lab side, and was department head when they decided to back out their Millennium PathNet upgrade. I’d like to hear his explanation for that.” Bruce argues that companies that develop their own IT systems often regret it because commercial offerings will eventually surpass them. He cites an article that claims Wal-Mart’s much-lauded internally developed IT systems now place the company at a disadvantage. I don’t know that I necessarily agree since even a short-term competitive advantage may make self-developed applications worth it, but it’s an interesting discussion.
From M_Miller: “Re: Misys. Steve Lohr, the leading software writer for the New York Times, slams Misys’ open source idea. Everyone knows that Newt is paid to give these quotes to Misys and Allscripts as part of his lame group, but man, Misys just can’t catch a break. The piece then goes on to call out athena’s model and Jonathan Bush’s take on what needs to be done.” The article agrees with me: dumping a poor-selling product onto the open source market doesn’t usually work. There’s no passionate developer community behind it. The article mentions Gartner’s Wes Rishel, who was “unimpressed” and who brought up that users would be clinicians, not the usual techies who embrace that kind of stuff (so he says, anyway, although that’s not what I thought Connect was). He likes Web-based SaaS technology. Sad that the Connect strategy was the supposed future of Misys Healthcare just a few months ago and now the related accoutrements have been donated like a rusted out Chevette.
And speaking of Misys, CFO Charles Lambert has been officially announced as departing, I’m told.
Former University of Maryland Medical Center CIO Mike Minear is named CIO of UC Davis Health System. If you want excruciating detail of what he’s being paid, see here (warning: PDF). He replaces Tom Tinstman (previous HIStalk mentions here).
This week’s Brev+IT is here. Sign up to your right.
Listening: new Coheed & Cambria. I’m in a prog-metal mood.
KU Hospital and KU Medical Center did nothing wrong in choosing a $50 million hospital system from Epic Systems despite a lower bid from Cerner, according to a report by state auditors. Cerner was somewhere between $1 million and $12 million cheaper than Epic over five years, but users had a strong preference for Epic.
The folks at Medicity, always anxious to be helpful, think they may have a few “I Am Mr. HIStalk” buttons laying around and offered to mail one to Lacey Underall if so. No promises, Lacey, but send me an address and we’ll see. I’m still trying to think of something fun and slighly guerrilla-ish to do at HIMSS. Many I should hire an obnoxious band to play on a flatbed truck outside the convention center (I’d be stealing the idea from Howard Stern). Or, I could offer speakers an under-the-table $50 to slip an HIStalk pitch into their PowerPoints and claim it was a mistake (it was a proud moment last year when my man John Glaser wore his button up on stage). Inga and I will be running around causing anonymous trouble, I guess.
A big year for SCI Solutions – their biggest ever, actually. They signed 33 new contracts, including Sutter, UVA, and Health First. Nice.
Justen Deal has thoughts on Kaiser’s potential outsourcing, “Together Again: KP and IBM.” He mentions IBM’s offshore presence (could that be a way for KP to offshore without taking the black eye it might bring?) Spoiler: Justen thinks that bringing in IBM would be good for both KP and Epic.
Rumor: Perot is laying off 1,000 people. Reason unknown.
Want to follow HIT stocks? I made a page with the big HIT stocks listed and a 20-minute delayed quote. Bookmark it if you’re so inclined.
The local paper profiles eClinicalWorks: 32 profitable quarters, 3,000 customers, 600% revenue growth in three years up to $38 million, and a tripling of employees to 550 in two years.
Miami Children’s hires a former GE Healthcare guy as CEO: M. Narendra Kini, MD.
To your right is a new poll: who should run clinical systems projects in hospitals? And to your left is a new Gold Sponsor, AT&T, which has mobility and wireless offerings for healthcare organizations. Hey, they’re my cell provider, so here’s a shout out and thanks for supporting HIStalk.
Sumter Regional Hospital is in first place to win an MRI machine. You can vote daily through December 31.
E-mail me. Happy Halloween, if you’re into evil undead and candy.
Inga’s Update
I reached out to a few folks asking their opinion of the status of the Kaiser/Epic implementation. Here is a note from someone who has been involved:
So the truth is that KP has successfully implemented more software in the past three years than they had in the previous 10 years. When you think about their size and compare that to anyone else, this has got to amaze anyone who really knows what this takes. They have had to industrialize their infrastructure to support the heavier load, and there have been a few hiccups with that infrastructure work, but they have already realized enormous benefits of this investment … it has been an unqualified success. Every installation of electronic health records requires physicians to significantly change their behavior in order to adopt and optimize the use of the system. The vast majority of KP docs who have used the system for more than six months adamantly reject any thoughts of going back to paper, but the changes involved in a deployment of this size invariably results in individual physicians who actively and vocally resist the change. The most surprising thing is how quickly the overwhelming majority of docs get past this reflex resistance to change.
If anyone else cares to share an opinion, we are happy to listen.
I have been mulling over the announcement that the HHS and CMS will pay 1,200 physicians for reporting quality measures using their EHRs. The government is calling it the “largest step yet” for boosting physician adoption (though if the country has 800,000 active physicians, helping 1,200 doesn’t seem that big a step.) The program will supposedly pay for itself with the reduction of duplication tests, ER visits, and medication errors. I realize that some private insurance companies offer quality care bonuses, but if there was that much of a savings wouldn’t all the insurance companies be jumping on the bonus bandwagon? I am all for using EMRs and agree they can improve care. But is there enough to this initiative to have any real affect?
All you ambulatory fans know that the MGMA has been in full swing this week in Philadelphia. Consequently, vendors are making numerous company and product announcements. A sampling:
Greenway Medical Technologies announces that Q1 sales were up 64% over the previous year.
Athenahealth announces that the 38-provider orthopedic clinic Campbell Clinic selected athenahealth’s PM and collection solutions.
Offering software as a service is suddenly fashionable. Sage Healthcare, Allscripts, and McKesson all announced new ASP offerings for their EMR/PM solutions.
Remember eClinicalWorks? From December until May, ECW was announcing one major deal after another. Since the summer, little news has been reported (Busy implementing? Marketing department on vacation? No big sales to announce?) ECW reappeared this week, announcing their partnership with the Hudson Valley HIE to provide the member doctors ECW’s EMR/PM system.
What is old is hip again! Demand for vinyl records is on the rise. Music purists are convincing more people that the sound quality is superior with analog recordings compared to the digital CD. I would bet money that Mr. H has a huge stack of Pink Floyd and Jimi Hendrix albums that he secretly listens to while writing HIStalk posts.
Heard that at a user conference not so long ago, a certain married, male HIT executive was busy sending text messages to some participants at 3 a.m., asking if they were “ready to party.” Anyone care to guess whether or not the recipients were young, attractive, and female (and if they ignored the message?)
Another fun game – fill in the blanks. I heard that [executive] is asking [beancounter] to do some things regarding revenue recognition that [beancounter] is not comfortable with; e.g., recognizing revenue a little on the early side. And, [company] just downgraded their forecast.
E-mail Inga.
From Jennifer DeNuccio: “Re: athenahealth. On fire.” Link. Shares added 4.1% Friday, closing at $40.60.
From LaDonna Fredericks: “Re: running implementation projects outside of the IS department. We did this, but IS is responsible for all support, including the new system, leaving them unprepared to support the new application. The implementation group doesn’t care because they’re running the project, not supporting production, so they have no interest in making decisions based on what’s supportable. That’s why our database installation is inappropriate for an organization our side. Plus, a rift has been created between the implementation’s group fantasy and the IS reality. Consultants are coming to bail out the ‘new and improved’ project scope.”
From Muffy Tepperman: “Re: Misys. Upcoming departures: Mike Pritts (development VP) and Neal DeRozario (CIO).”
From Dr. Mark Craig: “Re: Kaiser. Croc is partially correct. The merger is responsible for some efficency cuts, but each IT VP and their units were mandated to make cuts and most units have nothing to do with HealthConnect. The prevalent rumor is that the new CIO and his new hires are on an outsourcing train and the train is powered by IBM.”
From John Ulasewicz: “Re: PHR. Here’s what I’d buy for my aging parents: a PHR with links to local services so that the individual’s family could keep in touch with social services, the grocery delivery people, etc. A software blackboard on the site would allow those participating in the care to post any issues, reassuring comments, notes that the lawn is getting mowed and the newspapers picked up, etc. Anything that saves an emergency trip would be worth it.”
From Lacey Underall: “Re: HIMSS. What about the worker-bees that never go to HIMSS? I’m just sitting in my cube coding my tail off all day. I’d love an “I Am Mr. HIStalk” button. Are you going to make me scrounge around on Ebay or will you start selling them from your blog?” I think I tossed all the buttons because they were a depressing reminder of the lack of interest in them at HIMSS, where for two years I tried to get the 1,000 or so of them onto lapels with minimal success. Maybe a new giveaway is needed that doesn’t involve shipping heavy buttons to convention centers (and back).
From Abe Froman: “Re: MRI contest. I hadn’t gone through all the videos to realize that Sumter Regional was in the running. Thanks for pointing it out. I will be sure to – as they say in Chicago – vote early and vote often.” Link. Choose Sumter Regional Hospital from the drop-down, watch the two-minute video (which is good), and click Vote. You can vote once a day from a given PC through December 31. I’m sure the other contestants deserve a free MRI machine too, but I have to root for the hospital that doesn’t even have a permanent building to work from.
From Marshall Blechtman: “Re: PHR. CVS/Caremark will be launching a PHR in 2008. With access to health plan claims data and PBM data, they plan to incorporate healthcare financial planning (HSA) and disease management guidance. I think the guidance will include taking more pills. 
” I’m already sick of the proliferation of PHRs. Even if folks wanted to use them, surely they’d be confused by competing services. Maybe CCHIT should certify them since they’re not interoperable and many are likely to fail.
From Rob Donovan: “Re: CIO. Larry Stofko has been named CIO at St. Joseph Health System in Orange County. Removes the interim title.”
New Medsphere CEO Mike Doyle predicts that the company, which he claims is the only open source provider in HIT, will be the largest healthcare IT vendor.
Reminder: most HIStalk postings (especially if you’re reading on HIStalk2) have several reader comments at the bottom. Worth your time to peruse, even though I sometimes put one right here in the main body of HIStalk because it tickles my fancy.
WSJ says McKesson’s low debt, reasonable share price, and hefty HIT profits could make the company a private equity takeover target.
Premise is #71 in Deloitte’s 2007 Fast Technology 500.
Kaiser-Santa Clara is fined $25,000 by the state health department for killing a seven-week old baby with nutritional and medication overdoses, one 25x the prescribed amount, the other 9x. Kaiser admitted the mistake, but is appealing the fine. Shands UF kills a three-year-old with 10x overdose of arginine on October 10, for which it has already apologized, admitted responsibility, placed a pharmacist and nurse on leave, and settled with the family. The newspaper also reports that “Medications for intravenous infusions must now be reviewed by the pharmacy manager”, which seems unlikely given the huge volumes involved at Shands and the questionable value added in making one person the bottleneck.
An assistant to the MIS director of New York City’s chief medical examiner pleads guilty to embezzlement, money laundering, and conspiracy for her involvement in a scheme to steal part of FEMA’s $46 million in 9/11 relief funds intended for forensic information systems. Her boss goes on trial next month.
Texas Department of State Health Services will implement Mediware’s mediMAR in 11 hospitals.
E-mail me.
Inga’s Update
From Wompa1, in response to Mr. H’s comment that I am ambulatory-centric: “I remember thinking the same thing, but I love it. Having been in a number of large, inpatient, IT projects over the years, it is easy to breeze by the clinics. However, I can’t tell you how many projects I have seen lately involving NextGen, Epic, Allscripts, Logician/Centricity, and Healthmatics. In the monkey-see-monkey-do world of health IT, clearly the ambulatory side is picking up speed. The readers are happy to have you, and the perspective. Keep it up! We’re reading. I also agree with you on the notion that the inpatient people think they are more important.”
Here’s an interesting article on software-as-a-service vs. packaged applications. Jonathan Bush is quoted with this summary. “In Bush’s view, the Web equivalent of old-school software would be Yahoo charging $2,000 a seat for the ability to look up directions, rather than offering a free online mapping tool as it does today.” Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer disagrees, of course.
E-mail Inga.
From Eustice McGargle: “Re: PHRs. Here in SW Florida, a local physician developed a system for his own office. He then offered a PHR function to his patients. He has 400 of them paying $10 a month for access. It turns out that the demand is not so much from his patients but from their families up north, who use it to monitor mom and dad.” Now that’s an interesting angle: a parent’s healthcare report card for their kids to sign. There’s a definite marketing opportunity there. A smart doc could provide a value-added service by putting in a short note of status and concerns for the children to read once a month or so, giving them peace of mind.
From Tony Montana: “Re: PHRs. The adoption rate seems to be 4-6% overall. What we don’t know is the long-term utilization rate, which I bet will be horrible. People won’t use PHRs unless they have a compelling clinical need and benefit and most don’t.” That’s a challenge: if few people use them at all and even fewer use them religiously, integration with practice EMRs better be good enough so that docs don’t waste time checking, only to find nothing useful. People are vitally interested and motivated in healthcare only when they’ve been hit with life-changing health news. Lots of folks have a frenetic burst of fact-finding about glucometers, vitamins, and prescription meds right after they get them, but then lose interest once they realize their mortality is not imminently threatened.
From Stagger Lee: “Re: Susquehanna. Susquehanna Health VP/CMIO Angela Nicholas has announced her resignation. She has accepted a position with Siemens and will be working for Pamela R. Wirth, Susquehanna’s former VP/CIO who left for Siemens in 2005.” The hospital must be OK with it. Or, they should have written a better contract prohibiting hiring their employees.
From Abe Froman: “Re: Siemens. a gotta love Siemens. What’s next – will they try to get Disney to change their Soarin ride to Soarian?” Link. Siemens is running a contest in which hospitals of under 180 beds can win a free Magnetom Essenza MRI if their video of why they need one wins the most votes. It’s complete with hints on how to publicize the contest to the local newspaper and on YouTube. You can view the submissions on the site. Some are funny, with “we’re hicks” seeming to be the most common theme. The one from Clay County Medical Center (KS) called ‘Granny Gets and MRI’ is like an old-time silent movie and was pretty good. Leading is Murray County Memorial Hospital (MN) with ‘MCTV Cribs,’ which is nicely done. Last day to submit is November 30.
And speaking of Siemens videos: Marcus Johnson, one of our HIStalk friends at Sumter Regional Hospital (to which HIStalk readers donated $11,264 in March – thank you – after a tornado destroyed the hospital) is in the hunt for a free MRI. Pick Sumter Regional Hospital from the drop-down, watch their video, then vote for them like I did. The video is serious, showing the effects of the tornado and narrated by the CEO. You can vote once per day from a given PC.
From Crocodile Hunter: “Re: Kaiser. There are lots of organizational changes going on, the merging of KP HealthConnect into the IT organization being one of the biggies. The layoffs are mostly from the consolidation of organizations. But in reality, a hundred positions out of the thousands that work in IT is much less than the normal attrition rate. So, you might suggest that the merger of HealthConnect into IT is actually the bigger story here, not the layoffs.” It’s interesting that both Kaiser and Allina implemented Epic outside of the IT department, which I think is a great idea. IT departments don’t have the vision, influence, and resources to run a big clinical systems project, so carving it out means the hospital has to fund and staff the project in an easily auditable way.
From Soul Survivor: “Re: Misys. Nice move by Misys to open source Connect. They should consider doing the same for Tiger, Vision, and Misys EMR. No one buys those products either. The mandate is out that PTO (paid time off) will be used or paid at 50 cents on the dollar. Old sales commissions being settled. Auction to follow?” Unverified.
HIMSS will offer a MS-HUG Tech Forum on Sunday of the HIMSS annual conference, with sharing of best practices by users.
Speaking of HIMSS, I had a good time at the conference last year, I must say. It was cool seeing a big old HIStalk logo on the athenahealth booth with CEO Jonathan Bush yakking with HIStalk readers and having a bartender giving them expensive beers. And, seeing the “I Am Mr. HIStalk” buttons in the booths of Medicity and Picis. Since I’m incognito, that’s about all there was from the HIStalk front. Inga and I talked about throwing some kind of bash at HIMSS, but it’s so hard (and expensive) to get any sort of space. We’re open for ideas. Inga loves that schmoozing stuff.
Cerner chief marketing officer Don Trigg is re-elected to the board of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce.
Sponsor note: thanks to SolCom for upgrading their banner ad to become an HIStalk Gold Sponsor. I appreciate their long history of support. They just signed a big deal with William Osler for HIM and workflow solutions, which I mentioned earlier.
Sponsor note II: welcome and thanks to NextGen, HIStalk’s newest Platinum Sponsor. One of very few companies with a 2007 CCHIT certification for ambulatory EMR, #5 on the list of Forbes best companies, and a juggernaut in the physician systems market. Parent Quality Systems Inc. has a market cap of $1 billion, $163 million in revenue, and stellar return on investment and return on equity for you stock watchers. Many thanks to NextGen for spending a few of their ad dollars wisely by sponsoring HIStalk and its readers.
Here’s the most recent Brev+IT, available last weekend to those subscribing for free (see signup to your right). I haven’t check the signup stats lately, so here goes: HIStalk 3,206; Brev+IT 985. I’m sure there are some spammers on there, but that’s still encouraging and I appreciate it. I remember when the HIStalk list got up to 31 readers – I was insufferably happy to have folks who cared enough to sign up.
Idea: the people most interested in researching their own medical conditions connect via a growing number of disease-specific support and advocacy groups. Maybe those groups will provide or sponsor their own PHR.
Misys will make its Connect software available as open source through a new division called Misys Open Source Solutions. The devil’s in the details, though, and none were provided. Also announced by Misys: Misys MyWay, a hosted EMR for small practices (the renamed iMedica, I assume). The press release says a family of MyWay offerings is coming, so maybe they’re buying someone (the imminent ‘big announcement’ rumor is still out there). if someone appropriately cynical and musical wants to compose alternative lyrics to Frank Sinatra’s My Way, I’m sure there’s material for it in the announcement.
HIMSS announces an survey of its pet-named EMEA (Europe, Middle East, and Africa). Two priorities emerged: implementing regional/national EMRs and home care monitoring.
Retired CIO and now apparent consultant Peter Strombom is insulted that the state of Wisconsin is offering only $10 million in tax credits for EMR-adopting providers. That’s the bad thing about government welfare for businesses – they always want more. If it were my state tax dollars, I’m not sure I’d want profitable non-profit hospitals getting a handout of my money to buy business equipment.
The selection of six EMR companies for British Columbia doctors to choose from is contested, with the $108 million contract resulting in two resignations, an audit, and a suspicious check. Said one CEO whose company was not chosen: “This thing … makes me want to puke.”
An Indiana doc caught by the local newspaper putting medical records in a Dumpster says he’ll dispose of them properly (having been caught in the act). He was kind of an ass with the press, which is never a good idea: “This is a private houseekeeping matter and none of anyone’s business.” So, naturally the paper contacted some of his patients and goaded them into being outraged, printing their scolding comments along with HHS’s telephone number just in case anyone is interested in filing HIPAA complaints.
It’s a mystery: a nurse notices a vanload of men outside the hospital at 3 a.m. She sees a bunch of laptops and they say they’ve been hired to work on the hospital’s wireless network, then took off. The hospital says someone has been trying to hack its network.
Interesting: Stanford researchers figure out how to derive new data from old genetic experiments, coming up with some new discoveries from discarded data.
For all you Health 2.0 fanboys: a 31-year-old New York doctor practices only on the Web and via housecalls. His “eVisits” are conducted by video chat, IM, and e-mail, with his target patients being under 40 and located nearby. I’ve e-mailed to ask for an interview and he’s given a tentative OK (about five minutes after I e-mailed him, a good sign for an e-doc). It’s a brilliant, lifestyle-friendly practice idea, so I’m really interested in how it works for him and his patients. More to come, I hope.
If you signed up for the CCS Summit, Andy Eckert from Eclipsys has joined the CEO Power Session (with Jonathan Bush of athenahealth, Jeff McCaulley of Wolters Kluwer Health, and Glen Tullman of Allscripts). HIStalk is a sponsor, and given my lack of decorum, I decided to crash the party hard in my writeup instead of being button-down serious: “HIStalk is written by and for IT professionals and clinicians with 50,000 visits monthly. No fluff or press releases – just breaking news, deadly accurate industry rumors, expert opinion, and CEO interviews. We know the healthcare IT industry because we work in it. Your competitors hope you don’t read it!” Too brash?
E-mail me. I need your rumors and ideas.
Inga’s Update
MEDecision, Inc. announces their 3rd quarter financial results, and they weren’t too pretty. Net loss for Q3 was $2.92 million and total revenue was $9 million versus $12 million in 2006. For the fiscal year 2007, the company is forecasting an operating loss in the $4-6 million range.
Recently Mr. H told me I was very “ambulatory-centric.” I think he meant it in a derogatory way, as if people preferring the world outside of hospitals are somehow inferior to those dedicated to the inpatient setting. I wonder if that’s his unique personal quirk or if all hospital-types have the same bias.
So, if you are like Mr. H and bored by the ambulatory stuff, skip this next bit. iMedica announced the addition of 39 new practices for Q3, which is a 131% increase from same period in 2006. No mention how that translates to revenues and profits, however. It should be interesting to see how the Misys alliance affects the company in terms of sales and financial performance.
Just released: The MRI 2007 Survey OF EMR Trends and Usage. Some interesting findings include:
- The major factors driving EMR adoption in the hospital segment include patient safety considerations, efficiency and convenience, and satisfaction of physicians and clinician employees
- The major factors driving EMR adoption in the medical practice segment were improved patient documentation, efficiency/convenience, and remote access to patient information
- Major barriers to implementing EMR systems were lack of adequate funding or resources, anticipated difficulties in changing to an EMR system, difficulty in creating a migration plan from paper, inability to find an EMR solution/components at an affordable cost
Hospitals need to improve compensation, staffing levels, and recognition in order to improve employee satisfaction, according to a new Press Ganey report. The report surveyed 193,000 nurses, technicians, administrative personnel and other non-clinical employees and found that registered nurses were the least happy of the bunch.
E-mail Inga.
From Ninny: “Re: NHIN. HHS’ ONC said at the NHIN Trial Implementation startup meeting on Friday that the NHIN TI awards were under protest. Who’s protesting it? Often companies protesting Federal awards publicize their efforts. ONC did say that Kaiser Permanente and ‘Federal Partners’ (VA, DoD, CMS, SSA, etc.) are also part of the NHIN Collaborative, #10 and 11. KP is footing their own way.” I’m interested in who’s protesting, if anyone knows.
From Big Fan: “Re: interview. It’d be cool if you could interview Jocelyn DeWitt at the University of Michigan. They run their own homegrown EMR and CDR, are slowly implementing Eclipsys Orders, McKesson scheduling, have over 400 employees in IT, and run a buttload of best-of-breed systems. The curious part – how can they justify all that cost and overhead, how do they keep it all running, and manage all those interfaces. Are they/have they considered consolidating on a handful of vendors?” Good idea. I shall ask Inga to attempt contact.
From The PACS Designer: “Re: PHR list. AHIMA has a myPHR page that lists free PHRs.” Link.
From Digger O’Dell: “Re: CliniComp. John Reardon is out as CEO of Clinicomp, the third person as CEO in the last 3 1/2 years (Kremsdorf, then Witonsky). The founder wishes to retain control and has reinstated some previous staff in executive roles.”
From Wompa1: “Re: GE. Any idea how many organizations are using IDXtend/classic/flowcast/Centricity Business?”
Philips unveils its CliniScape wireless handheld device. I found a picture here.
A reader sent this link, showing that EDIS vendor Emergisoft is spending $100K a year on lobbyists. I don’t know what their cause is.
I’ve gotten several e-mails wanting to know more about the rumored Kaiser layoffs and their progress with HealthConnect (apparently highly touted at Epic’s user meeting). If you have information, let me know.
Orlando Portale tells me that Pomerado Hospital in San Diego has been evacuated because of the fires there, although IT systems are running normally. A million residents have been displaced, emergency shelters are filling up, and at least 1,000 homes have burned in San Diego County alone. You know the insurance companies are already poring over policy fine print looking for ways to get out of paying fire-related claims.
Cerner’s Neal Patterson buys a 1,308 pound steer named Chuck for $150,000, obviously unaware that the market price for ground Chuck is quite a bit less than $115 per pound. Actually, kidding aside, that’s a fine gesture and true to his (previously) humble roots.
The move of Eclipsys from Boca Raton to Atlanta will cost 54 employees their jobs.
HIMSS and Microsoft are taking MS-HUG worldwide, both apparently unsatisfied with anything less than world domination.
Premise CEO Eric Rosow is profiled in a local newspaper article on entrepreneurism.
Announced HIMSS keynoters: Steve Case, Bill Frist, Rob Kolodner, Mike Leavitt, Steven Levitt, and Eric Schmidt. Numbers 1,2, and 6 add up to quite a few billion in net worth. I’m waiting to see if anyone interesting will be on the View from the Top panel (longing for the Neal and Judy days).
Initiate Systems announces GA of its Initiate Provider provider management application. Also announced: Initiate and IBM will implement its Initiate Patient EMPI at Ochsner Health System (LA). IBM’s contribution is some HealthLink mumbo jumbo intended to make consulting sound packaged and proprietary: “Prolink4 is IBM’s process-centric, top-down project methodology that works to transform organizations from current to future states based on overall goals and objectives,” aka doing Gantt charts.
AMICAS announces that it signed 15 new contracts in Q3.
The former owners of shuttered Greater Detroit Hospital are fined $1 million after an owner was caught burning piles of medical records on his farm and others were found blowing down the street.
Nuance, apparently intent on closing a new acquisition each week, announces that it will acquire call center solutions vendor Viecore.
According to poll results so far (to your right), 11% of HIStalk readers keep a reliable, electronic personal health record. Higher than I expected, maybe inflated by PHR keepers anxious to be counted. On the other hand, that means that at least 89% of healthcare technology experts, many of the clinicians and software evangelists, don’t find enough value in PHRs to keep one for themselves. So, the Joe Sixpack number is probably something far less than 11%, although that’s still potentially dozens of millions of people. If PHRs were a TV show, they’d have been cancelled already.
The new Sunquest gets its first sale, a $1.4 million LIS contract for Children’s New Orleans. In the pipeline under Misys, no doubt, but still cool.
A fun Monty Python surgery sketch, featuring the machine that goes BINGGG. Note the irony: key player Graham Chapman really was an MD.
E-mail me. I need your rumors and ideas.
Inga’s Update
Despite my glamorous image (everyone does think I am glamorous, right?) I feel like such a nerd because I got so excited by the HIMSS keynote line-up! Mike Leavitt, Dr. Kolodner, the author of Freakonomics, the Google CEO … if only they could add George Clooney coming to discuss HIPAA privacy, it would be perfect!
Zagat, the restaurant rating guys, are teaming up with Wellpoint for a doctor rating guide. Patients will be able to rate their doctors based on trust, communication, availability and office environment. Too bad they left out clinical outcomes. Would have been fun to walk into an office and say, “Doctor, I hear you do an exquisite brain surgery.”
This is such great news that I am going to eat chocolate cake tonight to celebrate! Canadian researchers claim “jolly” women (those with higher BMIs) show fewer signs of depression, anxiety and negative moods. And all this time I thought the key to happiness was being a size 4.
E-mail Inga.
