Curbside Consult with Dr. Jayne 2/23/26

It’s clear that AI is here to stay. I’ve spent quite a bit of time looking at studies that seem to be either proving its value or dismissing it on the basis of inaccuracy and risk.

Healthcare people tend to look at it with a specific lens. I reached out to contacts in other industries to better understand how they are approaching it, and whether their professional organizations have produced policies or recommendations around its use.

The first person who responded to my query is in the field of law. The initial portion of his response addressed the high-profile problems with AI that have surfaced in the legal world. A number of cases involved attorneys who used AI to construct briefs, but failed to catch that the AI fabricated citations for cases that didn’t exist.

Similar to what we encounter in healthcare, issues exist with the content on which AI systems are trained. Attorney-client confidentiality must not be compromised by becoming part of a data set. Similar risks involve algorithmic bias and discrimination. Attorneys have been sanctioned for misusing AI, with some being fined for fictitious citations.

The legal community is discussing accountability for the use of AI. Ethics experts agree that attorneys are ultimately responsible for the accuracy of matters that are being handled in their name.

My attorney friend shared his opinion that even the best AI isn’t as good as some of his most seasoned paralegals and researchers. His firm tends to proceed with caution, although it does not have a formal policy on the use of the technology. He thinks about about using AI to create documents similarly to having a summer legal intern do it. He reads everything with a critical eye in case it misses the mark, just like interns sometimes do.

We chatted a bit about the idea that AI probably isn’t as good as a law student at the top of their class, but might be better than a student at the bottom of their class. This has parallels with medical education. It is different asking a fourth-year sub-intern to present a case than to ask a third-year student who is on their first clinical rotation to do the same.

We agreed that the idea of blind trust in AI is risky, especially when professional licensure is on the line.

The American Bar Association issued its first guidance on the ethics of AI use in 2024. It specifically noted the need to ensure that legal billings are appropriate for tasks that are conducted using generative AI tools.

The attorney in question is also a commercial pilot. He had a few things to say about the use of AI in the aviation space. Airlines have been using it for operations functions, including maintenance optimization and the modeling of passenger behaviors such as their likelihood to check bags or buy additional services and amenities. Consumer-facing AI includes support chatbots and booking and ticketing systems.

On the maintenance side, AI can help with troubleshooting complex airframes that generate sensor data. Mechanics also use it for maintenance documentation.

He mentioned incorporating AI into flight simulator systems. It uses real-world cases and events to create realistic emergency scenarios that might go beyond the experience of a human simulator operator or operational handbooks.

I must have posed my question at just the right time, because he mentioned a recent announcement about the US Air Force’s Flying Training Center of Excellence. It is developing an AI-based “Instructor Pilot GPT” that is designed to interact with students who are undergoing pilot training. The tool will be trained on flight manuals and aviation documentation. It will help student pilots assess their performance and will provide rapid access to reference procedures. Similar to the commercial side, they hope to use the technology in flight simulators.

The Air Force uses a closed training environment that contains documents such as military protocols, federal guidance, and flight-related publications. I chuckled when I read a quote from one of the people who is involved with the project, who referred to the subset of information as a “data pond.”

Another comment in the article sounded a lot like the conversations that we are having regularly in medical education. Students are on their phones using LLMs every day, so they will expect it as they move forward in training.

The article also notes important concerns that I hadn’t considered in healthcare, such as cybersecurity risks. What happens when your fighter jet GPT gets hacked and harmful information is injected? The same thing could happen to a healthcare system, which would provide the ultimate example of medical misinformation.

As far as professional organizations or regulations, the Federal Aviation Administration issued a formal notice on the use of generative AI tools and services in March 2025. The first page of the document highlights the need to ensure that generative AI use “is conducted in an ethical and responsible manner.”

The notice applies only to FAA’s employees and contractors, but it includes policy elements that are similar to what I see in hospitals and care delivery organizations. These include a requirement to request approval for using generative AI software, the ability to request support for specific use cases that have already been identified, and the need to ensure that AI tools that are found on the internet have been approved by the organization.

The FAA also cautions about the risks of AI infringing on intellectual property, the need to review AI-generated content for accuracy, the need to be transparent about where AI tools are being used, and the principle that it shouldn’t be used to “perform or facilitate illegal or malicious activities.”

I am waiting to hear back from contacts in other industries and will share if I receive compelling insights. If you or your organization does crossover work in areas other than healthcare, how are those industries tackling the use of generative AI? Leave a comment or email me.

Email Dr. Jayne.

Readers Write: Lessons from the ChatGPT Health Debate

Lessons from the ChatGPT Health Debate
By Robert Stewart

By Robert Stewart is CTO of Arbital Health.

A recent column by Geoffrey Fowler in The Washington Post that describes his disappointing experience with ChatGPT Health sparked discussion in the health IT community. While many remain optimistic about the long-term potential of platforms such as ChatGPT Health and Claude for Healthcare, Fowler’s piece highlights issues that healthcare leaders, clinicians, and technologists should examine carefully.

Variability and inaccuracy are not unique to large language model (LLM)-based systems. Many clinical diagnostics have known false-positive rates, and repeat testing is routine when results are unexpected. Clinicians themselves may reach different conclusions when presented with the same clinical information months later. Medicine has always operated within a probabilistic framework.

What is different with LLM-driven systems is their non-deterministic behavior when given the same input repeatedly. Identical prompts can generate materially different responses. Fowler demonstrated this when ChatGPT assigned his cardiac health scores ranging from a B to an F using the same underlying data. That level of variability can cause confusion or anxiety when applied to personal health interpretation.

Many consumer health AI tools are built on retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) architectures, in which the model is grounded using user-specific information such as medical records or wearable device data. Even when anchored to structured inputs, however, the LLM’s narrative interpretation can still vary, reinforcing the need for clinician oversight and appropriate guardrails when deploying these tools in consumer health settings.

It’s also important to recognize the potential psychological impact of these tools. Researchers such as Eric Topol caution against indiscriminate screening of asymptomatic individuals because it often produces “incidentalomas,”(findings that lead to unnecessary follow-up testing or treatment without improving outcomes. Consumer AI health scoring systems risk amplifying this phenomenon by continuously surfacing probabilistic interpretations in the absence of appropriate clinical context.

Wearable Data Challenges

Wearable device data introduces another layer of complexity. Anyone who works with longitudinal wearable datasets understands that the signal-to-noise ratio is inconsistent. Devices are removed for charging, replaced every few years, or switched across vendors that have different calibration baselines. Environmental and behavioral factors such as travel, altitude changes, illness, stress, or sleep disruption can produce statistically significant physiological changes that an AI system may misinterpret without broader context.

Jessilyn Dunn, PhD and her lab at Duke University have conducted extensive research that uses machine learning and statistics to extract valuable insights from consumer wearables, but the work remains challenging. Even highly targeted machine learning applications, such as arrhythmia detection platforms developed by companies like AliveCor, still operate with non-trivial false-positive rates. Wrapping a general-purpose LLM around wearable data without similarly rigorous modeling layers is unlikely to deliver clinically reliable outputs.

Security and Privacy Considerations

As consumer AI health tools evolve, security becomes increasingly important. Anyone who uses ChatGPT, particularly those who are sharing sensitive health information, should enable multi-factor authentication (MFA), which is one of the most effective controls for reducing account compromise risk.

Users should also recognize an important regulatory distinction. Information that is entered into consumer AI services is generally not protected under HIPAA. OpenAI’s enterprise offering, ChatGPT for Healthcare, is designed for HIPAA-covered environments and supports Business Associate Agreements (BAAs), but consumer versions operate under different legal frameworks.

The Takeaway for Health IT Leaders

The lesson from Fowler’s experience is not that consumer health AI lacks value, but that context, governance, and clinical integration matter. Non-deterministic systems that interpret noisy consumer data can easily generate variable outputs that users may misunderstand as clinical conclusions rather than probabilistic insights.

For health systems, payers, and digital health innovators, the near-term opportunity lies in combining LLM interfaces with validated predictive models, strong clinical workflow integration, and transparent communication about uncertainty. Without those guardrails, even well-intentioned consumer health AI tools risk creating confusion rather than clarity.

Readers Write: Doing Everything For the Patient, Not To the Patient

Doing Everything For the Patient, Not To the Patient
By Nassib Chamoun

Nassib Chamoun, MS is founder, president, and CEO of Health Data Analytics Institute.

“Do as much as possible for the patient and as little as possible to the patient.”

That single sentence, written by Bernard Lown, MD in “The Lost Art of Healing,” should serve as a universal guide to thinking about medicine, caregiving, and what it truly means to heal. Dr. Lown was my mentor beginning in my early 20s and remained a close friend until his death in 2021 at age 99, He was decades ahead of his time. He believed that medicine should integrate scientific rigor with moral imagination, and that clinical excellence without compassion is incomplete care.

Today, his words feel less like a reflection and more like a challenge. Our population is aging rapidly. Older adults are the fastest-growing consumers of healthcare services.

As more patients approach the later stages of life, the central question facing clinicians, health systems, and policymakers is not whether we can do more, but rather if doing more truly serves the patient. Increasingly, the evidence suggests that quality of life, not simply quantity of life, must be the defining outcome.

This is not a new conversation. In 1974, Balfour Mount, MD, who is widely regarded as the father of palliative care in North America, established the first hospital-based palliative care unit at Montreal’s Royal Victoria Hospital. Since then, the field has grown steadily. Decades of research demonstrate improvements in symptom control, patient and family satisfaction, alignment of care with patient goals, and, in many cases, lower healthcare utilization and costs.

More recently, the World Health Organization issued a call-to-action urging health systems to expand palliative care access. Not only for humanitarian reasons, but also as a sustainable response to the use of our healthcare resources.

Organizations such as the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) have worked to standardize best practices and train clinicians to deliver high-quality, interdisciplinary palliative care across settings. Leading physician researchers and ethicists have published extensively in peer-reviewed journals, academic texts, and mainstream media.

Despite this robust evidence base, many patients and families still experience end-of-life care as a stark binary: aggressive inpatient interventions on one side, or hospice and “giving up” on the other. Why does this false choice persist?

For me, this question is no longer theoretical. It is deeply personal. As my parents age, I have watched them navigate serious illness, both at home and in the hospital. Again and again, I have seen a system that is reflexively oriented toward intervention — more procedures, more monitoring, and more escalation.

The intent is usually good. But too often the outcome is suffering, including physical discomfort, emotional distress, and a loss of agency at precisely the moment when patients need it most. Where is palliative care in these situations?

End-of-life care should not be an either-or proposition. It should not require patients to choose between life-prolonging treatment that may diminish quality of life or dying at home without support.

Palliative care belongs alongside disease-directed treatment, especially during hospitalizations, where it can provide expert symptom management, clarify goals of care, support families, and guide thoughtful transitions home when appropriate.

I have seen the power of this model first hand. Palliative-focused hospitalizations can be transformative, not only for patients who experience relief from pain and fear, but also for caregivers who gain reassurance, guidance, and partnership. This approach preserves dignity, respects patient values, expands hospital capacity and access, and makes more responsible use of limited healthcare resources. Most importantly, it restores humanity to care.

For me, the conclusion is clear. When possible, our loved ones should not die in hospitals. They also should not have to forgo care, comfort, or hope.

To palliative care clinicians, healthcare leaders, policymakers, advocates, and anyone who has walked this path with someone they love, let us build a healthcare system that truly does everything for the patient, not to the patient. Compassion and evidence are not competing priorities. Together, they form the highest standard of care.

Readers Write: What a Modern Application Managed Services Model Should Deliver

What a Modern Application Managed Services Model Should Deliver
By Scott Gildea

Scott Gildea, MBA is EVP of client delivery for Optimum Healthcare IT.

For years, application managed services in healthcare has been treated as a singular staffing solution. When teams were short-handed or roles went unfilled, organizations added overseas resources to keep systems running. That approach worked until the environment changed.

Today’s healthcare landscape is more complex than ever. EHRs, ERPs, and enterprise platforms are deeply connected to patient care, revenue, and operations. Downtime is no longer just an inconvenience, it is a risk. At the same time, IT teams are burned out and being asked to support transformation while maintaining stability.

In this environment, application managed services cannot be about coverage alone. They must deliver accountability, consistency, and operational confidence.

This is the Moment for Application Managed Services

As a whole, healthcare organizations are at a dramatic inflection point in healthcare IT. Some of the biggest reasons for this include:

• Mounting pressure surrounding increasing costs, stagnant budgets. and fluctuating reimbursement rates.
• Socioeconomic pressures, such as increasing prices.
• Downward pressure from health system executives to be more efficient and forward-thinking.

Application managed services must keep pace with the expedited evolution of technology in healthcare. Change is here for most organizations, whether it takes the shape of AI, the mergers and acquisitions, or the increasing socioeconomic pressures. 

Health systems are no longer asking whether they need managed services. They are asking which models will actually support their organizations over the long term. The answer lies in delivery models that are built specifically for healthcare, designed for accountability, and focused on the people who keep these systems running every day.

What a Modern Application Managed Services Model Should Deliver

Health systems are not looking for another vendor. They are looking for a delivery model that they can rely on every day, not just during go-lives or major initiatives. Traditional approaches often fall short.

What organizations need now is a managed services model that is explicitly built for healthcare enterprise applications, operates as a valid extension of the internal team. and has clear ownership and shared accountability.

A modern application managed services solution should answer a few basic questions:

• Who owns the day-to-day operations?
• How are issues identified before they become incidents?
• How is performance measured and improved over time?
• How does the model scale without disrupting internal teams?
• Will this allow us to keep up with the ever-changing landscape of health IT, including EHR updates, AI advancements, and more?

When managed services are designed well, they reduce operational noise. Leaders spend less time reacting and more time planning. Internal teams stay focused on strategy and improvement instead of constant firefighting. That does not happen by accident. It requires healthcare-specific experience, disciplined delivery, and a model that is built for complex enterprise environments.

Morning Headlines 2/23/26

RevSpring Acquires TrustCommerce, Expanding Integrated Payments and Delivering End-to-End Payment Visibility Across Healthcare

Healthcare payment solutions vendor RevSpring acquires TrustCommerce, an integrated payment platform vendor.

Waystar Reports Fourth Quarter and Fiscal Year 2025 Results, Provides 2026 Guidance

Waystar reports Q4 results: revenue up 24%, EPS $0.10 versus $0.11, beating revenue expectations but falling short on earnings.

FDA taps AI executive to lead digital health center

The FDA names former Annalise.ai Chief Medical Officer Rick Abramson, MD director of its Digital Health Center of Excellence, which provides input on the FDA’s regulatory review of digital health technology.

UMMC clinics statewide remain closed after cyber attack

University of Mississippi Medical Center officials enlist the help of several federal agencies as they communicate with hackers behind Thursday’s ransomware attack.

Monday Morning Update 2/23/26

Top News

Healthcare payment solutions vendor RevSpring acquires TrustCommerce, an integrated payment platform vendor.

RevSpring acquired Kyruus Health in September 2025 and Loyale Healthcare in early 2020.

RevSpring was acquired by investment firm Frazier Healthcare Partners in May 2024.

Reader Comments

From BoothWeary: “Re: exhibiting at ViVE and HIMSS. We spend mid six figures on booth, travel, advertising, and private events. I can’t tie any of that to booked revenue. Are we fooling ourselves?” You are fooling yourself if you expect badge scans and foot traffic to turn directly into leads. Value comes from using the booth as a landing zone and meeting hub rather than a lead farm. Exhibiting can even save money if you can book meetings with prospects and existing customers without separate travel costs. Show up with a list of the top 10 accounts that you hope to influence and try to get your executives face time with theirs. ROI is generated in back-of-hall private meeting rooms, not the carpeted glad-handing area that is populated mostly by nondecision-makers. Still, be nice, since they might have been charged as underlings to scout and report back to their big boss.

From Seeking Answers: “Re: HIMSS26. The keynote speaker list is wacky, maybe trying to match the celebrity appeal of ViVE.” On the list is Jon McNeill (who quit as a Telsa sales exec, then lasted just 18 months as COO of Lyft); actor and snowcat casualty Jeremy Renner; and streetwear mogul Daymond John of “Shark Tank.” You will need to squint to see any connection to healthcare or health tech. The one keynoter who might be fun is the coach of the Savanna Bananas, although I wouldn’t stick around for his last-day slot.

From Bonecrusher: “Re: the Alliance for Advancing Rural Healthcare. Isn’t this, and others like it, just a thinly veiled sales opportunity for the vendors involved? Seems like a gussied up consulting push to take advantage of those with fresh influxes of federal cash.” SAIC forms the newly announced AARH to “help state governments … execute the Rural Health Transformation program.” SAIC’s sudden interest in rural healthcare coincides with the federal government’s plan to plow $50 billion into it. SAIC earns $7.5 billion in revenue selling mostly to the federal government, so it is approaching AARH like a prime contractor:

• Form an “alliance” to exclude competitors as states issue RFPs.
• Capture some of the revenue that each partner generates by locking in its own implementation, infrastructure, and integration services..
• Build a long sales runway with the multi-year program.
• Create the perception of turnkey execution and the appearance of aligning with federal goals.

HIStalk Announcements and Requests

Around 30% of poll respondents have been demoted at some point in their careers. I have seen variations that involve losing all direct reports, such as being moved to special projects, tapped as an advisor, or assigned to formulate strategy. All of those are compliments. Organizations are smart to let a high-performing executive who doesn’t manage people well the chance to focus on their strengths. Value shouldn’t always be measured by headcount or budget.

New poll to your right or here: For exhibitors at ViVE and/or HIMSS, what is the #1 benefit received? What one thing keeps your company coming back, and has that changed?

Attending ViVE? Your updates, photos, and rumors are welcome and I won’t name you unless you ask. Tell me.

Sponsored Events and Resources

Publication: HIStalk’s Guide to ViVE 2026 lists the activities of sponsors at the conference.

Contact Lorre to have your resource listed.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Waystar reports Q4 results: revenue up 24%, EPS $0.10 versus $0.11, beating revenue expectations but falling short on earnings. WAY shares have lost 39% in the past 12 months, valuing the company at $4.8 billion. CEO Matt Hawkins talked up AI in the earnings call, saying that 50 of the company’s solutions use AI, 40% of its revenue is generated by AI-embedded tools, and 30% of bookings were attributed to AI capabilities. He added that its Altitude AI prevented $15 billion in claims denials, reduced appeal time by 90%, and drove double-digit increases in denial overturn rates.

From a Veradigm update call:

• CEO Don Trigg emphasized the company’s ongoing “Reset, Recover, and Reignite” plan to stabilize operations and refocus strategy.
• The company will discontinue six unnamed low-revenue products.
• Veradigm’s preliminary 2025 results show flat revenue and a significant decline in cash due to debt financing and share repurchases.
• Trigg says that the company is making progress toward becoming current on its SEC filings but provided no specifics. It will file 2023 and 2024 information in a Super 10-K, which is a single annual report that includes data that would have been included in overdue previous reports.
• The company has established Pune, India and Raleigh, NC as its hubs. It closed three locations in 2025, will close two more in 2026, and will vacate its Chicago headquarters in 2027.
• Veradigm eliminated 15% of its workforce in 2025.
• Trigg says that Veradigm was previously run as “a holding company as opposed to an operating company,” but will now focus on growth and market impact.

Sales

• Mayo Clinic implements the productivity platform of Dock Health in cardiovascular, e-consult, and specialty contract programs.

Announcements and Implementations

Belgium-based cardiologist Michal Nedoszytko, MD, PhD creates Postvisit.ai, an agentic AI post-visit companion for patients. The tool, which he developed in Claude Code in seven days as a hackathon entry, helps patients understand and follow up on their treatment by using a “reverse AI scribe.”

Element Biosciences introduces a high-throughput benchtop sequencing system that can generate a whole genome sequence for $100.

Other

A Fierce Healthcare report says that the Coalition for Health AI has shelved its flagship plan to create a national network of independent AI assurance labs and shifted its focus to other initiatives. CHAI, which was founded in 2024 with several health systems as founding members, has drawn scrutiny from Republican lawmakers who question whether CHAI’s work overlaps FDA responsibilities and whether participation by large technology companies creates potential conflicts of interest. HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. went further, calling CHAI a “cartel” while backing the department’s position that private groups should not receive implicit government endorsement or taxpayer support for assurance labs. Founding members Amazon and Microsoft resigned after the White House signaled its broader opposition to the group and to AI regulation generally. CHAI says that the change in direction reflects stakeholder feedback, particularly stronger interest in post-deployment monitoring over upfront certification.

The Wall Street Journal reports early testing of an “underwear-able” flatulence monitoring system and tracker for studying diet-related gas and bloating. The top 3% of studied gas-passers in the study cohort will earn a “Prodigious Hydrogen Producer” plaque. Hat tip to my favorite medical research explainer @EricTopol for headlining this piece with “you gotta be kidding me,” which was also my initial reaction as I quickly verified that it wasn’t April 1.

Sponsor Updates

• RLDatix releases the results of the “2026 Leadership Pulse Survey from the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives.”
• TruBridge and Arcadia join the new Alliance for Advancing Rural Healthcare.
• Afga HealthCare lists its new US installations, included an expended rollout of enterprise imaging at Tampa General Hospital.
• Waystar’s AI capabilities deliver industry-leading outcomes and earn client accolades.
• Optimum Healthcare IT publishes a new white paper titled “Your Ultimate Checklist for a Successful Healthcare CMMS Migration.”
• Nordic releases a new “Designing for Health” podcast featuring Becket Mahnke, MD.
• Optimum Healthcare IT opens a managed services center of excellence in Costa Rica. 
• SlicedHealth releases a new episode of its “Substance Over Form” podcast titled “Your 2026 Guide to Price Transparency.”
• WellSky will expand its clinical coding and documentation advisory services to additional Adoration Home Health locations.

Blog Posts

• Healthcare data platform considerations + options in 2026 (Arcadia)
• A Unified Digital Front Door: Reimagining Patient Engagement Through LLM-Based Orchestration (Impact Advisors)
• Four Revenue Cycle Management Tips for Small Healthcare Organizations (Med Tech Solutions)
• The Game Changing Impact of Early Autism Diagnosis (Netsmart)
• Meeting health systems where they are on the digital modernization journey (Nordic)
• What Is Transparent AI for Medical Coding? Why Black Box Tools Fail the 2026 Audit (Nym)
• Create a Policy for Medicare Conflicting Indicators: CPT 63032 Under OPPS vs. MPFS (TruBridge)
• Individual Access Services Under TEFCA (Zen Healthcare IT)

Contacts

Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
Get HIStalk updates.
Send news or rumors.
Follow on X, Bluesky, and LinkedIn.
Sponsorship information.
Contact us.

HIStalk’s Guide to ViVE 2026

Agfa HealthCare

Booth 2203

Contact: Kara Clarke, director or marketing, North America
kara.clarke@agfa.com
978.761.9432

At ViVE 2026, Agfa HealthCare will showcase the latest advancements in its cloud-ready, SaaS-enabled Enterprise Imaging platform, designed to reduce complexity, strengthen interoperability, and elevate both IT performance and the clinician experience. Highlights include its zero-footprint streaming technology for fast, full-fidelity image access anywhere care is delivered; as well as RUBEE workflow orchestration; and embedded, vendor-neutral AI capabilities that streamline operations and support confident clinical decision-making within unified imaging workflows. Global Chief Medical Officer and Global Director of Enterprise Imaging & AI Anjum Ahmed, MBBS, MBA will attend and is available for meetings to discuss clinician-first imaging strategy, AI in practice, and the evolving role of enterprise imaging in connected care environments.

Altera Digital Health

Meeting Cube 350

Contact: Heewon Shin, segment marketing manager
heewon.shin@alterahealth.com

A global healthcare IT leader, Altera Digital Health develops and elevates technology to bring next-level healthcare within reach. Altera’s approach to our solutions is changing the way healthcare is delivered. We see the summit of what healthcare can be, but rather than total transformation, we’re focused on helping organizations take the steps they need to get there.    

At ViVE, we’re excited to showcase how Altera is addressing the top challenges healthcare providers and payers are facing today by enabling interoperability and data-sharing, strengthening financial stability, and leveraging AI to help alleviate clinical and administrative burden. Stop by our meeting cube (#350) to meet with our experts and learn more about how Altera can help you deliver next-level care. Click here to schedule a meeting. For more, visit www.alterahealth.com.

Arcadia

To arrange a meeting, visit https://arcadia.io/resources/vive-2026.

Join Arcadia at ViVE 2026 as healthcare leaders, policymakers, and innovators come together to shape the future of digital health. As the industry accelerates toward true interoperability and consumer-grade digital experiences, Arcadia is helping organizations turn connected data into real progress — reducing friction, improving outcomes, and empowering patients at scale.   

Arcadia Chief Strategy Officer Aneesh Chopra will moderate a discussion with CMS’ Amy Gleason titled “How CMS Is Modernizing Healthcare” on Tuesday, February 24 from 11:40am–12:00pm on the West Coast Stage. CMS’ healthcare technology push has moved quickly from announcement to execution. Following the launch of its White House-backed Health Tech Ecosystem initiative — and early commitments from more than 60 major health and technology organizations — CMS is now calling on the industry to deliver real progress toward a truly patient-centric digital ecosystem in early 2026. This session explores how a voluntary, standards-based alliance — paired with CMS’ broader interoperability push — aims to unlock seamless data sharing, consumer-grade digital tools, and patient-facing applications focused on chronic disease management, digital-first navigation, and streamlined check-in. The ultimate question: can this effort finally reduce administrative burden and deliver on healthcare technology’s long-promised potential to empower patients?

Artera

Booth V-835

Contact: Adrianna Hosford, chief communications officer and head of marketing
adrianna.hosford@artera.io
833.234.9355

Artera is the proven agentic healthcare company, leveraging a decade of deep expertise to support 2 billion patient communications annually. Our solutions empower humans and AI agents to work together to fix patient communications across text, phone, and web, unifying the entire patient journey – from scheduling and intake to billing and more. Trusted by over 1,000 healthcare organizations (including specialty groups, FQHCs, large IDNs, and federal agencies), Artera directly increases staff efficiency, boosts patient engagement, and improves the provider bottom line, helping patients get the care they need with simplicity and speed.   

2B+ Annual Comms. | 200M+ Patients | 10yrs Experience | FedRAMP High in Process | www.artera.io |   

Join us at ViVE to experience our fully autonomous AI Agents in action. We’ll demonstrate how these agents manage a range of complex workflows (scheduling, FAQ resolution, appointment management, and more) to reduce staff burden and improve the patient experience. Stop by our booth to connect with our experts and explore strategies for optimizing patient access, implementing AI-driven patient communication, and much more. Plus, receive a $25 Amazon gift card when you schedule and attend a meeting with an Artera team member. As an added bonus, you’ll be entered to win an iPad Pro in our post-event raffle. Schedule a meeting with our team here.

Cardamom

Contact Adam Dial to arrange a meeting.

Contact: Adam Dial, chief customer officer
adam@cardamom.health
608.469.6154

Cardamom is a minority-owned, technology-forward health IT professional services company serving healthcare providers, payers, and health IT organizations. With a team-based, AI- and automation-first approach focused on committed outcomes, Cardamom helps customers more effectively use data, analytics, AI, and applications to improve care quality, reduce costs, and enhance patient and provider experiences. Cardamom is also committed to growing industry talent by hiring high-potential team members without prior health IT experience and providing comprehensive training and mentorship to deliver industry-leading results. For more about Cardamom, visit https://cardamom.health.   

Team Cardamom is excited to attend ViVE! Join us and Vitea for cocktails and appetizers on Monday, February 23 from 6:00-8:00pm in the Pico Boardroom (7th floor) at the Moxy Hotel. We can’t wait to connect!

CereCore

Booth 1154 in the Club CHIME Lounge

Contact: Phil Sobol, CCO
Phil.Sobol@CereCore.net
615.344.4169

CereCore works behind the scenes to empower hospitals and health systems with IT services around the nation and globe. Looking for IT and application support, technical professional and managed services, strategic IT consulting and advisory services, or EHR consulting? Let’s meet so we can help you find EHR experts to maximize your investment, tap into support desk solutions that will result in happier users and providers, supplement your technical and support teams, and connect you with the right talent so you can better manage IT operations. Find meaningful change with CereCore’s healthcare IT managed services. See you in the Club CHIME Lounge at ViVE26.

Clearsense

Booth 1741

Contact: Kära Freeman, senior director, revenue operations
kfreeman@clearsense.com
612.747.2134

Gartner’s “2026 CIO and Technology Executive Survey” shows cost optimization is the number one priority shaping CIO objectives over the next two years.

Join us live on the Palm Stage at ViVE on Monday, February 23 at 4:30pm for the CHIME-curated case study panel, “IT Cost Optimization and Enterprise Strategy.” This featured session brings together Clearsense CEO Jason Rose with Trinity Health Chief IT Strategy Officer Mike Prokic and CTO and VP of Product Engineering Nick O’Connor for a candid discussion on how application decommissioning can be transformed into a scalable financial strategy. Trinity Health will share its roadmap for eliminating nearly $80 million in recurring operating expenses, offering a practical blueprint for any health system looking to drive cost optimization while protecting its workforce — without compromising patient care.

Clearsense will also be available for one-on-one discussions throughout the event. For health systems looking to reduce financial waste, manage merger-related complexity, or advance digital transformation initiatives, this is an opportunity to explore one of the most powerful — and underused — levers available to health systems today.

Visit us at booth 1741 or schedule a meeting in advance using our booking link.

About Clearsense
Clearsense is a healthcare data-enablement platform designed to help health systems optimize operating costs while revitalizing access to data. The 1Clearsense Platform enables large-scale decommissioning of redundant legacy applications using a disciplined, assembly line–style approach that prioritizes speed and cost impact. By retiring legacy systems while preserving access to historical data through active archiving, Clearsense helps organizations eliminate ongoing costs tied to licensing, infrastructure, and support while establishing a stronger data foundation for analytics, AI, and research. Learn more at clearsense.com.

Clearwater

Booth 618 in the Cybersecurity Zone

Contact: Lisa Munro, director of marketing
lisa.munro@clearwatersecurity.com
205.767.9141

Clearwater is healthcare’s largest pure play cybersecurity and compliance firm helping organizations across the healthcare ecosystem move to a more secure, compliant, and resilient state so they can achieve their missions. We provide a deep pool of experts across a broad range of cybersecurity, privacy, and compliance domains; purpose-built software that enables efficient identification and management of cybersecurity and compliance risks; managed cloud services; and a 24/7 Security Operations Center with managed threat detection and response capabilities.   

Visit us in the Cybersecurity Zone to experience our latest innovations and connect with our team about the future of cybersecurity, data integrity, and digital resilience in healthcare. Be sure to catch our presentations in the Cybersecurity Data Innovation theater:    

Wearing Two Hats: A CIO/CISO Case Study in Cyber Resilience (Monday, February 23, 1:35-1:55pm) 
When ransomware struck and key security leaders departed, Enloe Health faced the reality many community hospitals know well –  limited resources, expanding risk, and one leader wearing multiple hats. In this candid discussion, Enloe Health’s CIO and CISO will share how the organization rebuilt its cybersecurity program, regained leadership trust, and strengthened resilience without overextending staff. Attendees will walk away with practical insights for navigating cyber incidents, staffing constraints, and executive accountability in small-to-mid-sized healthcare environments.   

When the Cloud Becomes the Attack Surface (Tuesday, February 24, 10:05-10:25am) 
Healthcare organizations are moving fast to the cloud, but security models haven’t always kept pace. In this fireside chat, a healthcare cloud security architect and healthcare security leader will unpack the most common cloud misconfigurations, identity mistakes, and visibility gaps hospitals encounter and why they’re so hard to detect. Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of how to manage cloud risk across complex, multi-cloud environments without overwhelming internal teams.

Clinical Architecture

Booth 1241

Contact: Marck DuBois, chief revenue officer
marck_dubois@clinicalarchitecture.com
317.580.8400

Meaningful outcomes start with high-quality data. Our data quality solutions give you the ability to objectively assess and improve patient information, normalize and uplift data, and transform message formats. Visit booth 1241 to learn more about the PIQXL Gateway, our implementation of the PIQI framework, which allows you to measure the quality of patient information and pinpoint the root cause of issues for improvement.

EFax by Consensus Cloud Solutions

Booth 1918

Contact: Alyssa Stephens, events
alyssa.stephens@consensus.com
844.804.1234

Visit the EFax by Consensus Cloud Solutions booth at ViVE to see how we’re turning healthcare’s biggest data bottleneck into your greatest clinical advantage. We’re going far beyond traditional faxing by using AI, NLP, and machine learning to transform static, unstructured documents into structured, HL7-ready data. Don’t let critical patient insights stay trapped in digital scans — learn how our automated data extraction slashes administrative burden, accelerates treatment, and drives revenue for providers and payers alike. Stop by booth 1918 for a free latte and watch a live demo of your data in motion to see why the future of the continuum of care is no longer unstructured.

CTG

Booth 1125 & Booth 318 in the Cybersecurity Zone

Contact: Sarah Blafer, marketing team lead, demand generation
Sarah.Blafer@ctg.com
860.942.2180

CTG, a Cegeka company, delivers IT and business solutions that enhance digital agility. Over the last 35-plus years, we’ve supported more than 1,000 healthcare organizations, empowering them to modernize systems, improve performance, and advance digital initiatives with innovative services and technologies. Our expertise spans EHR implementation and managed services, cybersecurity, ERP, cloud, infrastructure, IT/application support, and clinical optimization. Visit CTG at booths 1125 and 318 to learn more.

Divurgent

Club CHIME

Contact: Danny Arnold, EVP of growth and strategy
Danny.Arnold@divurgent.com
518.495.2594

Divurgent is a full-service, healthcare-focused/HIT consulting firm led by people you actually want to work with. We’re one of the only firms out there that has your back for the whole journey. We can help you select an EHR or tool, implement it, staff it, bring you live, optimize it, and more. Three-hundred sixty degrees. Most of our focus is on EHRs, but we do much more than that. We think beyond the system and below the surface. Think workflow, digital strategy, operational readiness, change management and more. Sure, we can help augment your talent or get boots on the ground, but we’re most excited by helping you solve your most complex challenges. Our consultants have worked for health systems, so they’ve been in your shoes and understand operations and clinical demands. Give us a problem and we’ll solve it together. And before we do any of that, we listen.

Ellkay

Booth 1516

Contact: Morgan Hassell, marketing director of communications
morgan.hassell@ELLKAY.com
602.663.0529

Ellkay is a trusted healthcare data enablement partner helping payers, providers, labs, and health IT companies simplify interoperability and build AI-ready data foundations. Through our modern platform and deep healthcare expertise, we help organizations connect, manage, and optimize data across their ecosystem — without adding complexity.   

At ViVE, meet with Team Ellkay to learn how we help organizations:

• Streamline workflows and reduce operational friction.
• Simplify data exchange across systems, partners, and networks.
• Build scalable, secure data strategies that support innovation.   

Why stop by? If you’re navigating fragmented data, legacy systems, or growing interoperability demands, Ellkay brings both the technology and the expertise to help you move faster with confidence.   

Special Events 
Join us for Happy Hour at booth 1516 — both days! Stop by to connect with our team, enjoy a drink, and see how Ellkay is powering seamless interoperability behind the scenes.

Want to plan ahead? Set some time with us here. Let’s connect — and raise a glass to better healthcare data.

Elsevier’s ClinicalKey AI

Booth 1041 in the AI @ ViVE Zone

Contact: Meg Maguire, events manager
m.maguire@elsevier.com

Discover how ClinicalKey AI can support clinical decision-making at the point of care. Visit booth 1041 in the AI @ ViVE Zone and join our expert speaker session. Physician Executive Claudine Lott, MD will present on implementing AI at scale on Monday, February 23, and CTO Rhett Alden will present on API-enabled AI content integration on Tuesday, February 24. See how trusted content and AI can streamline workflows and elevate patient care.

Five9

Booth 2049

Contact: Roni Jamesmeyer, senior healthcare marketing manager
roni.jamesmeyer@five9.com
972.768.6554

Five9 provides a comprehensive suite of CX solutions, powered by Five9 Genius AI, to elevate customer experiences that deliver better business outcomes in the cloud contact center space. The New CX redefines how brands connect with customers through seamless and efficient AI-driven journeys that anticipate and meet each customer’s unique needs. Our unified cloud-native offering enables AI and human agents to create hyper-personalized customer experiences, so every customer interaction is more connected, effortless, and personal. Trusted by 3,000+ customers and 1,400+ partners globally, Five9 brings together the power of our AI, our platform, and our people to drive AI-elevated CX. For more information, visit www.five9.com.

Fortified Health Security

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Booth 1347

Contact: Rachel Bryant, marketing coordinator
rbryant@fortifiedhealthsecurity.com
904.316.3310

Join Fortified Health Security at ViVE 2026 to explore the latest in digital health innovation, cybersecurity, and healthcare transformation. Fortified is built for healthcare, offering tailored solutions to help you address your unique challenges, navigate the ever-changing legislative landscape, and working alongside you to create a stronger cybersecurity posture.   

Connect with our team at booth 1347. Set up a meeting ahead of time by emailing connect@fortifiedhealthsecurity.com. Join us at one of our events on Monday, February 23, when we will host an exclusive reception at the Grammy Museum, followed by a Nightcap in the City of Angels at the Moxy hotel. Get all the details to secure your spot here: https://fortifiedhealthsecurity.com/event/vive26/. We look forward to seeing you in Los Angeles!

Get-to-Market Health

Contact Steve Shihadeh to arrange a meeting

Contact: Steve Shihadeh, founder and CEO
steve@gettomarkethealth.net

We partner with healthcare technology leaders to accelerate growth, strengthen go-to-market execution, and build lasting customer relationships. Whether navigating post-investment expansion or launching new solutions, GTMH helps companies market, sell, and scale in ways that drive sustainable success. “Driving Growth in Healthcare Technology”

Health Data Movers

Contact Brooke Foster to arrange a meeting.

Contact: Brooke Foster, marketing coordinator
Brooke@HealthDataMovers.com
847.404.0326

Health Data Movers (HDM) is a healthcare technology services firm. We are trusted partners to healthcare organizations, biotechnology companies, and digital health enterprises through our services – data management, integration, project management, and clinical and business applications. We are the smart choice for creating unique solutions that empower patients and providers by unleashing the potential of healthcare data and technology.

Find us at our focus group, “Conversions without Chaos: Strategic Planning for High Stakes Healthcare Data Migration,” on Sunday, February 22 at 4:15pm.

Join Health Data Movers and CitiusTech on Tuesday, February 24 from 6:00-9:00pm for Data & Drinks After Dark at ViVE! RSVP here, space is limited!       

We Make IT Happen! Visit www.healthdatamovers.com.

Impact Advisors

Contact John Stanley to arrange a meeting.

Contact John Stanley, chief growth officer
john.stanley@impact-advisors.com
562.243.4937

Impact Advisors is a leading healthcare management consulting firm committed to solving the industry’s emerging and evolving challenges through tech-enabled operations performance improvement. Our high-performing team of clinical, financial, operations, and technology experts collaborate to architect quality solutions and deliver measurable value for our clients. We are the most awarded consulting firm in healthcare, with services recognized among Best in KLAS for 18 consecutive years and a culture deemed a “Best Place to Work” by Modern Healthcare for 16 years.

Lincata

Booth 2206

Contact: Adam DeRocher, chief revenue officer
adam.derocher@lincata.com
712.541.9132

Lincata’s Bedside Operating System (OS) transforms hospital televisions into digital experience tools that launch MyChart Bedside TV directly in-room. It’s simple. LincTV, coupled with MyChart Bedside TV, existing TV screens, cameras, microphones and other equipment, enables health systems to create the foundation for smart room capabilities and virtual care. LincTV consists of a proprietary set top box and purpose-built MDM, which provides flexibility, scalability, security, and ease of deployment.

Med Tech Solutions

Contact Kaitlyn Nelson to arrange a meeting.

Contact: Kaitlyn Nelson, director of account solutions and development
knelson@medtechsolutions.com

Stoltenberg Consulting, a leading healthcare technology consulting firm and proud Med Tech Solutions (MTS) brand, helps hospitals and health systems maximize the value of their EHR systems. With deep clinical and financial module expertise across Epic, Oracle Cerner, Meditech, NextGen, eClinicalWorks, and Veradigm, Stoltenberg’s EHR-certified consultants bring an average of 15+ years of real-world hospital experience to every engagement. Earning 3x Best in KLAS recognition for Partial IT Outsourcing, Stoltenberg specializes in EHR implementation, managed services including help desk and legacy system support, go-live command centers and ATE support, and flexible staffing solutions. Focused on reducing EHR burden, lowering support costs, and improving clinician and patient experience, Stoltenberg partners with healthcare organizations nationwide to drive meaningful, measurable outcomes for EHR improvement. No matter where you are in your EHR journey, partner with Stoltenberg and the MTS family of brands to help you make the most of your technology investment.

Director of Account Solutions and Development Kaitlyn Nelson and Chief Client Officer Imran Siddiqui will be on site at ViVE26. Please submit meeting requests here.

Medicomp Systems

Booth 2329

Contact: James Aita, director of business development and strategy
info@medicomp.com
703.803.8080

Medicomp delivers the industry’s only physician-curated universal data foundation, transforming healthcare data into trusted intelligence through its evidence-based Clinical Intelligence Engine, Quippe. Quippe connects information across domains, normalizes every input, and validates AI outputs to ensure accurate, interoperable insights at the point of care — fueling innovation, improving accuracy, and unlocking the full value of clinical data.

Medicomp will be showcasing entirely new functionality that streamlines clinical workflow, combining technologies like ambient listening, natural language processing (NLP), Model Context Protocol (MCP), and leveraging its universal data foundation and knowledge graph to deliver the efficient, intelligent clinical workspace that clinicians have been craving. 

The gap between data and understanding is probably costing you – in denied claims, compliance penalties, technology ROI, clinician burnout, and patient safety risks.

Stop by the Medicomp booth to learn how your systems can benefit from:

• Clinically validated LLM outputs.
• Diagnostic intelligence that understands context, is evidence-based, and makes disparate data computable.
• Clinical grade agents based on a universal data foundation.

Solve the data reliability problem with diagnostically intelligent clinical data solutions.

To learn more, visit Medicomp.com.

Meditech

Booth 1436

Contact: Rachel Wilkes, associate VP of marketing
rwilkes@meditech.com
781.774.4555

Join Meditech in booth 1436 as we showcase how the latest evolution of the Expanse EHR is helping healthcare organizations thrive. Built on a secure, cloud-native platform, Expanse provides the technological infrastructure necessary to help organizations balance clinical excellence with long-term financial sustainability.

Meditech will spotlight Expanse’s intelligent EHR tools that minimize cognitive strain, boost satisfaction, foster loyalty, and improve health outcomes. Key features include AI tools that function as intelligent collaborators, interoperability solutions like Meditech’s nationwide Traverse Exchange network for seamless data integration and consolidation, and patient empowerment tools like MyHealth patient portal’s AI-assistant that supports active patient participation.

Hear from the leaders defining the future of health IT. Meditech and customer executives will lead several high impact discussions at ViVE 2026, including:

• Fueling Rural Transformation panel discussion with Meditech EVP and COO Helen Waters.
• EHR Maturity Moment panel discussion with Meditech EVP and COO Helen Waters.
• The Supply & Demand for Patient Data featuring Meditech Senior Director of Interoperability Mike Cordeiro
• When Small Gets Tough: Digital Health in Resource -Thin Environments with panelists Wooster Community Hospital Health System VP and CIO of Information Systems Eric Gasser and Meditech Chief Marketing and Nursing Executive Cath Turner, MBA, RN-BC.
• How AI Fixed a Hidden Fax Drain on Staff Time featuring Northfield Hospital and Clinics Manager of Information Technology Debbie Oathoudt.

Meditech invites guests to an in-booth networking reception on Monday, February 23, from 4:45-5:45 pm in booth 1436. Learn more about Meditech’s presence at ViVE by visiting its event page.

MRO

Booth V-330

Contact: Brad Hawkins, VP of payer solutions
BHawkins@mrocorp.com
601.405.2470

MRO is “The Single Source for Smarter Data” – driving a new era of clinical data intelligence where data is connected, structured, and transformed into actionable insights. The result – confident decisions, operational precision, accelerated research, and most importantly, better patient care. This innovative model for clinical data management is built for speed and scale, combining FHIR-native connectivity, deep clinical expertise, and advanced automation to turn a fragmented healthcare ecosystem into a connected pathway where every data point delivers impact. The outcome is a faster, smarter, more secure platform for managing enterprise clinical data that drives better outcomes and creates revenue-generating opportunities for our client partners, while enhancing security, compliance, and clinical integrity. With 24 years of trusted solutions and partnerships, MRO knows that a stronger healthcare ecosystem begins with smarter data, leading to data-driven decisions and better performance. Learn more at www.mrocorp.com.

Nordic

Meeting Room 547

Contact: Rebecca Whaley, SVP of marketing
Rebecca.Whaley@NordicGlobal.com

Navigating the flux of the healthcare landscape takes a seasoned partner who can envision technology’s role in your organization’s success and execute the right plan.

With a singular focus on healthcare and proven experience, Nordic understands the big picture and is ready to take on your toughest technology and business challenges.

Connect with us at meeting room 547 to discuss our end-to-end solutions and how they can help you solve for today and tomorrow. Reserve your spot!

Nordic is also proud to sponsor CHIME’s ViVE Welcome Reception for CHIME members. Connect with members of our team on Sunday, February 22, from 5:30-7:00pm at the JW Marriott Los Angeles.

Learn more about what Nordic is doing at ViVE 2026 here.

Optimum Healthcare IT

Booth 2202

Contact: Larry Kaiser, CMO
lkaiser@optimumhit.com

Optimum Healthcare IT is a Best in KLAS healthcare IT digital transformation and consulting firm based in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. Optimum’s comprehensive service offerings include Enterprise Application Services, Digital Transformation, and Workforce Management, which features our Optimum CareerPath skill development program. Backed by a leadership team with extensive expertise, we deliver tailored healthcare consulting solutions to diverse organizations.   

Optimum Healthcare IT has the right pit crew at the right time for your organization. We prepare you for the track and keep you on the track with each of our specialized crew members. You have desired and required outcomes; we make sure you meet them.    

Make a Pit Stop at:  

• Booth 2202  
• CHIME Stage on February 24 at 3:30pm – From Tune-Up to Top Speed: How 2 Major Health Systems Achieved Cloud Success 
• Sunset Stage on February 25 at 9:25am – Reducing Clinician and IT Burden with Just One Click

PerfectServe

Booth 1665

Contact: Jenn Corcoran, senior marketing manager
jcorcoran@perfectserve.com
802.379.5352

Struggling with after-hours coverage, missed handoffs, or “who’s on call?” confusion? At ViVE, PerfectServe is offering complimentary 15-minute workflow reviews for healthcare leaders who want to identify gaps in their communication and scheduling processes – and leave with clear, practical next steps. In 15 minutes, we’ll: 

• Walk through any visitor’s current communication and scheduling workflow. 
• Identify failure points that create delays, burnout, or risk. 
• Highlight opportunities to simplify, automate, or integrate with the EHR. 
• Share how peers are addressing similar challenges.   

Visitors will leave with a clearer picture of where things break down, practical ideas to take back to teammates, and a benchmarked perspective from other health systems.   

Who should book time? This is ideal for CMOs, CIOs, and COOs; clinical operations leaders; IT leaders responsible for clinical communication; physician and nursing leadership; and scheduling managers. Book a review here.

Why PerfectServe?
PerfectServe helps health systems accelerate speed to care by bringing communication and scheduling into a single, EHR-integrated platform. We help organizations create a single source of truth for staff scheduling; enable secure, role-based care team communication; power a reliable clinical contact center; and, finally, answer, with confidence, “Who’s on call right now?”

Praia Health

Contact Scott North to arrange a meeting.

Contact: Scott North, VP of partnerships
scott.north@praiahealth.com

Praia Health is the patient experience orchestration platform for health systems. We help health systems attract, engage, and retain patients by supercharging their portals and digital tools with seamless, personalized journeys in one platform. The result is higher retention, lower costs, and measurable ROI.

Sonifi Health

Viosk 2136

Contact: Jared Allen, SVP of sales
jallen@sonifihealth.com
801.386.1450

Sonifi Health provides industry-leading, interactive patient engagement technology proven to improve patient outcomes and staff productivity. The EHR-integrated platform is designed to anticipate the needs of patients and clinicians, infusing the principles of hospitality into care experiences. As part of Sonifi Solutions, Inc., the company supports more than 300 million end-user experiences annually. Learn more at sonifihealth.com.

TeamBuilder

Booth 1667

Contact: Taylor Bockweg, VP of sales
taylor@teambuilder.io

TeamBuilder is the Operational Intelligence platform for healthcare scheduling, purpose-built for ambulatory care. Traditional scheduling tools rely on static rules, staffing ratios, or forecast-only models that fail to reflect how care is actually delivered. TeamBuilder takes a fundamentally different approach. Its intelligence evaluates multiple operational signals — including appointment complexity, provider mix, staffing capabilities, throughput constraints, and available clinical space — to understand true demand and capacity. By modeling supply as capability rather than headcount and continuously re-optimizing as conditions change, TeamBuilder enables predictive scheduling for both staff and space. This allows healthcare organizations to move from reactive schedule management to proactive operational planning. The result is clearer visibility into capacity, improved access, and reduced labor inefficiency across clinics, specialties, and regions.

Morning Headlines 2/20/26

UMMC suspends some services after cyberattack

University of Mississippi Medical Center closes all of its clinics following a Thursday cyberattack that kept users out of Epic and other systems.

Exa Capital Acquires Clinical Workforce Management Platform StaffReady

Investment firm Exa Capital acquires clinical workforce management software vendor StaffReady.

Hims & Hers Announces Agreement to Acquire Eucalyptus, Accelerating Its Vision to Become the Leading Global Consumer Health Platform

Hims & Hers will acquire Australia-based online clinic operator Eucalyptus for $1.15 billion.

News 2/20/26

Top News

University of Mississippi Medical Center closes all of its clinics following a Thursday cyberattack that kept users out of Epic and other systems.

HIStalk Announcements and Requests

Here’s a two-question quiz: (a) is your company participating in HIMSS26?; and (b) does it sponsor HIStalk? If both answers are yes, then complete this form to describe your participation and I’ll include it in my online guide. If B is a no, then contact Lorre because you are spending three expensive HIMSS days wooing non-decision-makers who are trolling for swag ands soiree invitations, but you’re missing the inexpensive opportunity to catch the attention of the actual decision-makers who frequent HIStalk all year.

Dr. Jayne’s latest post references this earworm of a song, which now has me hooked. I also learned that  longtime HIStalkapalooza contributor Bonny Roberts recently joined the company, CognomIQ, as VP of customer success.

Sponsored Events and Resources

Publication: HIStalk’s Guide to ViVE 2026 lists the activities of sponsors at the conference.

Contact Lorre to have your resource listed.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

A Boston Globe article calls the former Steward Health Care hospitals that other systems acquired “the fixer-upper from hell,” as new owners discover hidden financial problems, deteriorating facilities, and deeper-than-expected operating losses. Boston Medical Center will spend $80 million to replace Steward’s EHR, which it says is so dysfunctional that it struggles to get paid, while Brown University Health spent “tens of millions of dollars” just to operate the system and prepare to replace it. Steward implemented Meditech Expanse in 18 hospitals in 2022 and used Athenahealth for ambulatory care.

Investment firm Exa Capital acquires clinical workforce management software vendor StaffReady. The buy-and-hold enterprise software company also owns human service EHR vendor PrecisionCare.

Hims & Hers will acquire Australia-based online clinic operator Eucalyptus for $1.15 billion.

People

Healthmonix hires Pierre Menard (Trella Health) as CTO.

Announcements and Implementations

HIMSS President and CEO Hal Wolf appears on the short-form, pay-to-play TV program “Viewpoint with Dennis Quaid” to promote AI in what comes across as a self-congratulatory infomercial. Past episodes have highlighted wineries, a cruise line, and casinos. The show wins awards, at least the kind where you attach your check to your self-nomination with full expectation of “winning.” Quaid delivered the keynote at HIMSS09, speaking about patient safety after a Cedars-Sinai medication error nearly killed his newborn twins. He later settled with Cedars and Baxter, which sold the 10,000-unit heparin vial and 100-unit Hep-Lock that hospital staff mixed up because they violated hospital policy that requires pharmacist verification. HIMSS gave a $10,000 donation to Quaid’s patient safety foundation, which accomplished nothing as far as I can tell, merged with another organization within a year, and was later sold to a for-profit college.

Government and Politics

An Indiana otolaryngologist is sentenced to 97 months in federal prison for billing Medicare and private insurance $50 million for balloon sinuplasty procedures that she hadn’t actually performed, which netted her $20 million that she now has to repay.

Sponsor Updates

• AdvancedMD launches a new release that includes an ambient listening tool, presenting suggested action items from patient transcripts, managing PBM requests, enhanced appointment scheduling and cancellation, and AI-driven analysis.
• Tegria releases a new report titled “The Access-Driven Enterprise: How Health Systems Are Defining, Enabling, and Advancing Access Strategy.”
• Findhelp publishes a new case study titled “How Essentia Health Increased Patient Trust by 66% with Findhelp.”
• Jason Peterson, MBA, MS (Tegria) joins Canopii Collaborative as AVP of client partnerships.
• The Validation Institute names Judi Health a Health Value Award winner in Pharmacy Benefit Management.
• Medicomp Systems releases a new “Tell Me Where HIT Hurts” podcast episode featuring Civitas Networks for Health CEO Jolie Ritzo.
• Fortified Health Security announces TPRM with VendorIQ, a third-party risk management solution that helps healthcare organizations assess and track vendor cybersecurity risk.
• Meditech congratulates customer Ontario Shores Centre for Mental Health Sciences on winning its second HIMSS Davies Award.

Blog Posts

• Building a foundation of trust: How responsible AI is built (Altera Digital Health)
• 20 Risk adjustment software vendors to consider in 2026 (Arcadia)
• Beyond the counter: Pharmacy teams can impact care delivery (Wolters Kluwer Health)
• The Denial-Free Revenue Cycle: Tools and Tactics to Keep Costs in Check (FinThrive)
• Why Healthcare Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM) Must Change (Fortified Health Security)
• Preparedness in Ambulatory Healthcare: Are Your IT Systems Ready for What’s Next? (HCTec)
• How a Leading Cancer Center Achieved $122 Million in Revenue Optimization in Eight Months: A Revenue Integrity–Driven Success Story (Impact Advisors)
• A collaborative path to improving maternal health through meaningful connections (Meditech)
• Oracle Cerner Staffing Resource Guide: Tackling 8 Key Cerner Support Problems Amid Ongoing EHR Market Movement (Med Tech Solutions)
• Achieving the real ROI of AI: 5 takeaways for clinical, financial, and VBC success in 2026 (Navina)

Contacts

Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
Get HIStalk updates.
Send news or rumors.
Follow on X, Bluesky, and LinkedIn.
Sponsorship information.
Contact us.

EPtalk by Dr. Jayne 2/19/26

Clinical Informatics is a broad specialty. But depending on our job roles, we sometimes only get to work in a handful of its domains.

I’ve always enjoyed public health informatics work and being able to identify opportunities where we can make changes that help thousands of patients and families. Pregnancy continues to carry higher risks in the US than in other developed countries. I recently ran across the Baby2Home app that is designed as “a one-stop platform supporting perinatal families through an evidence-based collaborative care model.”

The tool includes mental health screening, access to stress management resources, and connectivity to care managers for support. It also offers the ability to track infant-related parameters such as feeding, sleeping, diaper changes, growth, and vaccinations.

Researchers tested the tool during a multi-year study that ended in 2025, with 642 first-time parents randomized to receive either typical postpartum care or typical care plus the app. Members of the intervention group had improved mental and physical health scores and were more confident in their parenting skills compared to those in the control group. The data was presented at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine meeting on February 11. Although the tool is currently investigational, I found it compelling and will be watching to see what happens next.

Speaking of companies I’m following, I was delighted to see a recent LinkedIn post containing a video from the folks at CognomIQ. The peppy beat perfectly channels their call for organizations to “Drain that stagnant swamp of a 1990s data lake.” The post says, “We’re not mincing words or hiding behind flowery rhetoric.” They weren’t kidding, since they call out several prominent vendors by name.

The snappy chorus of “Healthcare data sucks, you can’t dress it up” had me rolling. So did, “We build the board a house of glass and pray the question’s never asked.” All of us have been there, but few are willing to become a lightning rod by saying it out loud. Props to the team that created this campaign. I’ll see you on the dance floor.

From Captain Incredulous: “Re: LinkedIn. In a moment of weakness, I accepted a LinkedIn request from a friend of a friend. Within 24 hours, my new connection emailed me at my work address. He asked me to introduce him to a well-known CEO in my network and advocate for a partnership meeting. He even went as far as to suggest a draft email for me to use. He has now sent three emails about this issue.”

The reader shared the email thread, and it is certainly presumptuous. Additionally, I found some irony that the reader failed to notice: the draft email included mentions of how the author’s company could help the CEO at his previous employer rather than his current one. Putting myself in the reader’s shoes and knowing the CEO in question, I would definitely mention it to him, if only for a chuckle.

My inbox is bursting with cold email outreach efforts asking to connect at ViVE next week. Colleagues are receiving similar messages from startups that are desperate to meet. Most use words like synergy, partnership, and collaboration. Of those in my inbox, many include the salutation “Hey.” I know ViVE is the hip cool cousin of the conference scene, but it still feels unprofessional to me.

My favorite request just said, “I will be attending VIBE and connecting with people across the healthcare space” without stating the requester’s company or why it might be relevant to me. The misspelling of the conference name captured my attention, but I’m still not going to book a meeting.

From Jimmy the Greek: “Re: AI answers that are obviously incorrect. Check out this thread, where I asked whether I should walk or drive to the car wash.” AI recommended walking if the user didn’t mind exercise and if the weather was decent. It suggested driving if short on time or if the route isn’t pedestrian friendly. It completely missed out on the fact that the car would not be at the car wash if the user walked. It confidently stated that “walking is the more elegant move,” unless the car wash was of a certain configuration. It concluded by asking the user to specify what kind of car wash was involved so it could “pick the smoothest plan.”

The average healthcare IT team consumes a large volume of caffeinated beverages, so this article in the Journal of the American Medical Association caught my eye. The authors investigated whether long-term consumption of coffee and tea is associated with dementia risk and cognitive function. The study was large, with 132,000 participants and up to 43 years of follow up. The findings showed that, “Greater consumption of caffeinated coffee and tea was associated with lower risk of dementia and modestly better cognitive function, with the most pronounced association at moderate intake levels.” No similar association was observed with decaffeinated coffee.

Study participants were healthcare workers. Females were drawn from the Nurses’ Health Study and males from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. Data was collected every two to four years using a food frequency questionnaire.

As we all know, correlation does not imply causation. One should also be cautious about extrapolating these findings to non-healthcare workers since many of us have other behaviors that might not be typical. A shout-out to all the emergency department workers out there who have disordered eating habits, disrupted sleep, and fond memories of colleagues sneaking out through the ED doors to smoke cigarettes before returning upstairs to counsel patients about smoking cessation.

I’m a stickler for starting meetings on time to be respectful of those who are punctual. I’ve been fortunate to work in organizations that use the 25/55 meeting scheduling paradigm, which gives people five minutes to transition between calls or meetings. I’ve seen how it can help more meetings start on time.

Even without a back-to-back meeting schedule, some people are habitually late. During a recent discussion on meeting management, a colleague shared an article about people who arrive late and the causes. Although some people may be overscheduled or previous meetings might end late, there is also the phenomenon of “time blindness,” in which people are unable to identify how long an activity might take or to understand how much time has passed.

People might also arrive late if they don’t want to engage in pre-meeting banter. I’ll admit that I haven’t thought much about that. Starting on time reduces the available time for small talk, but it’s something to think about the next time I’m on someone else’s meeting and they’re “just waiting a few more minutes for people to arrive.”

How does your organization support on-time meetings? Are agendas and timekeepers a must or something only found on the wish list? Leave a comment or email me.

Email Dr. Jayne.

Morning Headlines 2/19/26

Rainfall Health Announces $15M Series A Investment to Support Hospitals Impacted by New CMS Revenue Opportunity

Rainfall Health, which offers AI-powered healthcare compliance and reimbursement solutions, raises $15 million in Series A funding.

Garland cancels telehealth contract after community pushback

The City of Garland, TX cancels its contract with Dallas-based telemedicine provider MD Health Pathways after several residents complain of the need to opt out of the city program’s automatic enrollment.

Cleveland Clinic teaching artificial intelligence to read brain waves and detect seizures in seconds

Cleveland Clinic pilots an AI tool developed with startup Piramidal to detect seizures from 24-hour ICU EEGs, monitoring 120 patients daily whose studies would otherwise each require about two hours of technician review.

Healthcare AI News 2/18/26

News

CNN reports that AI training firm Mercor is paying subject-matter experts, including physicians, hundreds of dollars per hour to validate and refine the commercial AI models of other companies. Mercor, which was founded in 2023 by three 19-year-old college dropouts who are now billionaires, generates $500 million in annual revenue and carries a $10 billion valuation. The company says that the most in-demand expertise is in software engineering, finance, medicine, and law.

In India, the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh proposes that every resident be assigned an AI-powered personal doctor to track health data and offer advice on diet, lifestyle, and preventive care. He met with Bill Gates this week to discuss integrating the state’s digital health records with other platforms.

A man says that he used Anthropic’s Claude AI to negotiate a $163,000 reduction of a hospital’s $195,000 bill for four hours of ED care that his uninsured brother-in-law received before dying of a heart attack. He asked Claude to create a worksheet that listed each billed CPT code and the corresponding Medicare payment, which totaled $29,000 for the same services. He offered that amount to the hospital, arguing that its original bill included improper unbundling, mutually exclusive services, and an inpatient procedure billed as outpatient. The hospital countered at $37,000, the parties agreed to split the difference, and they executed a settlement agreement that Claude drafted.

The United Arab Emirates launches Amal, an AI-powered physician assistant that conducts pre-visit interviews with patients, creates medical summaries for physicians, and answers post-visit patient questions. The system was developed by Boston Health AI, which offers a live, interactive online demo.

Business

Elsevier expands ClinicalKey AI clinical decision support tool with a full-text, copyright-cleared knowledge base of 1,000 journals and major guidelines, adding real-time citation traceability, daily updates, workflow APIs, and enhanced security to strengthen trust and point-of-care usability.

Mental health AI startup Kintsugi shuts down after raising $30 million and places its technology in the public domain. Its product analyzes the journal recordings of users to detect signs of anxiety or depression. CEO Grace Chang says that it is not financially viable for startups to build healthcare AI applications because investors expect rapid annual recurring revenue growth while FDA regulatory clearance takes significant time.

Research

A survey of 50 health system executives by Guidehouse and HIMSS finds that while 78% have AI projects in progress, only half feel ready to implement them. Major concerns include cybersecurity, competing financial priorities, data quality, and lack of internal expertise.

Other

Cleveland Clinic pilots an AI tool that it developed with startup Piramidal Inc. to detect seizures from 24-hour ICU EEGs, monitoring 120 patients daily whose studies would otherwise require about two hours of technician review each.

AI systems are increasingly embedded in clinical workflows to generate alerts and automate tasks, yet their unreliable outputs still require nurses to interpret and manage them in real time. Nurses recognize AI’s potential to improve documentation and monitoring, but they call for stronger testing, greater transparency, and meaningful frontline involvement in development.

Contacts

Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
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This Week in Health Tech 2/18/26

Morning Headlines 2/18/26

Danaher to buy Masimo in $9.9 billion deal in diagnostics push

Drug and diagnostics company Danaher will acquire Masimo, a leading vendor of blood oxygen monitoring technology, for $9.9 billion.

Workforce reduction at Baystate Health aims to drive efficiency

Baystate Health (MA) cuts 117 corporate positions and decides to outsource management of its clinical assets to TriMedX.

Pivot Point Consulting Emerges as a Unified Healthcare IT Powerhouse Following Its Acquisition by Innovative Consulting Group

Innovative Consulting Group acquires Pivot Point Consulting.

News 2/18/26

Top News

Drug and diagnostics company Danaher will acquire Masimo for $9.9 billion.

Masimo is a leading vendor of blood oxygen monitoring technology.

A federal jury ordered Apple to pay Masimo $634 million in November 2025 for infringing on its smartwatch blood oxygen monitoring patents.

Reader Comments

From Bueno: “Re: Sachin Jain article. Did you see this?” I hadn’t seen it, but “When Patients Win, Hospitals Lose” describes the conundrum in which hospitals make more money when their outcomes are poor. Some quotes:

• No one said “we need more sick people.” But economically, that was the implication. When better health becomes a financial threat, something is profoundly broken.
• Airlines don’t justify crashes to protect repair revenue. Fire departments don’t root for fires to keep budgets stable. Yet healthcare routinely normalizes illness as financial necessity. If your organization only survives when people are hospitalized, the business model is misaligned with the mission.
• We need some people to stay sick so others can get care. That is not a sustainable ethical position.
• If hospitals lose when patients get healthier, whose side is the system really on?

HIStalk Announcements and Requests

I read the “Lonesome Dove” series last week, all 3,000 pages of it, and then watched the six-hour miniseries for probably the 30th time. I watched the first episode again last night in honor of Robert “Captain Augustus McRae” Duvall, who died this week at 95. The first time I watched it many years ago, it was straight through, after which I restarted it and watched all six hours again without a break. The surly bartender scene is my favorite — watch the bemused Woodrow Call smile tightly, turn to the door, and place hand on gun at the bartender’s first derogatory comment knowing full well what is about to happen. Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones are just outstanding. For Mr. Duvall, who has always said that the Gus role was his career favorite, here’s to the sunny slopes of long ago.

Sponsored Events and Resources

Live Webinar: February 18 (Wednesday) 2 ET. “From Blind Spots to Insights: Gaining Real-Time Visibility into Healthcare Risk.” Sponsor: CloudWave. Presenters: Jacob Wheeler, MBA, director of sales engineering, CloudWave; Mike Donahue, chief operating officer, CloudWave. Resilience starts with the ability to see clearly, across every endpoint, cloud workload, user, and clinical system. Join CloudWave’s cybersecurity leaders for an in-depth session on how real-time visibility transforms your ability to detect threats early, respond decisively, and strengthen resilience across the care ecosystem. Attendees will learn the practical steps that hospitals can take to move from reactive defense to resilient action.

Publication: HIStalk’s Guide to ViVE 2026 lists the activities of sponsors at the conference.

Contact Lorre to have your resource listed.

Acquisitions, Funding, Business, and Stock

Drug, therapy, and remote patient monitoring company Perigon Health 360 spins out Medesto Health, which offers an intelligent patient engagement and care coordination platform.

Baystate Health (MA) cuts 117 corporate positions and decides to outsource management of its clinical assets to TriMedX. Employees working on Baystate’s clinical engineering team will become TriMedX employees in May.

Redditors attribute Northwell Health’s recently reported IT layoffs to the system’s conversion to Epic, with one mentioning that most of those pink-slipped had been working with legacy systems. The New York-based provider began making cuts and reorganizing operations last year. It is still dealing with lawsuits related to a former employee who secretly filmed patients in the bathrooms of its sleep center. Northwell took more than a year to notify 13,000 patients of the incident.

Innovative Consulting Group acquires Pivot Point Consulting. The combined organizations will operate under the Pivot Point brand.

Sales

• Hartford HealthCare (CT) selects AI tools from Sift Healthcare to improve reimbursement workflows and outcomes.

People

BayCare (FL) promotes Robert Carvajal to CISO.

Hippocratic AI names Anoop Sangha, MD (Transcarent) associate chief medical officer, Eduardo Reis, MD (Cognita) VP of strategy, and Niloy Sanyal (LeanTaaS) chief marketing officer.

Announcements and Implementations

Oracle Health makes its Clinical Note AI agent available to providers in the UK after a successful pilot program with several NHS facilities.

Medical University of South Carolina launches virtual nursing in its NICU using technology from VirtuAlly.

Aliso Ridge Behavioral Health (CA) implements Xferall’s patient transfer and care coordination software.

Fujitsu automates its software development lifecycle with its Takane LLM and agentic AI, which it says increased productivity 100-fold. The company will target deployment across its government and healthcare systems by the end of the fiscal year.

Government and Politics

VA Deputy Secretary Paul Lawrence says upcoming rollouts of the department’s Oracle Health-based EHR will return to pre-deployment levels of productivity more quickly than the initial sites that went live on the new software several years ago. He adds that the system is meeting contractual uptime targets and that 10 of the last 12 months have been free of incidents.

The Social Security Administration will connect to the TEFCA network through Qualified Health Information Network EHealth Exchange in early spring.

The federal requirement that hospitals post their prices publicly hasn’t reduced cost or improve the ability to patients to shop around, but it has benefited health systems and insurers that use the data for contract negotiations.

Other

End-users rate Netsmart the top vendor in behavioral health and community-based care, according to a Black Book Research survey of 1,100 behavioral health professionals.

Sponsor Updates

• Agfa HealthCare details its latest enterprise imaging sales, including an expanded partnership with Tampa General Hospital.
• Arcadia releases “Healthcare data management software: A comprehensive guide.”
• The “NCPDP Unscripted” podcast releases a new episode titled “How Real-Time Data Improves Access to Medications: A Conversation With Arrive Health.”

Blog Posts

• AI and A/R Automation in Healthcare: Six Reality Checks Behind the Hype (AGS Health)
• Streamline Clinical Workflows with MEDITECH Expanse 2.2: A How-to Guide (CereCore)
• From shift to shift: How consistent technology extends nurses’ care (Altera Digital Health)
• The healthcare data lake vs. other data storage structures (Arcadia)
• EHR Compliance Checklist for CIOs (Bizmatics)
• Cultivating the garden of leadership: Lessons for female leaders in growth, resilience, and boldness (Cardamom)

Contacts

Mr. H, Lorre, Jenn, Dr. Jayne.
Get HIStalk updates.
Send news or rumors.
Follow on X, Bluesky, and LinkedIn.
Sponsorship information.
Contact us.

Morning Headlines 2/17/26

Oracle Health Clinical AI Agent, Clinical Note Helps UK Doctors Spend More Time on Patient Care

Oracle Health makes its Clinical Note AI agent available to providers in the UK after a successful pilot program with several NHS facilities.

Medesto Ends the Maze

Drug, therapy, and remote patient monitoring company Perigon Health 360 spins out Medesto Health, which offers an intelligent patient engagement and care coordination platform.

Amazon One Medical Introduces Health Insights to Help Patients Better Understand Their Lab Results

Amazon One Medical offers members AI-powered insights into their lab results via the One Medical app.

Curbside Consult with Dr. Jayne 2/16/26

I met up with some clinical informatics friends over the weekend. Our conversations focused on a few key themes. One was how much time we’ve spent in the field, as we realized that the most junior member of the group just hit the 20-year mark.

None of us set out to specifically look for technology-related roles, but each of us found our way to the field as we identified gaps in what was happening around us and stepped in. The most senior of the group got involved because he had an engineering background and saw what was going on elsewhere in the country with respect to electronic charting. He wanted to see his institution be a leader in the field rather than a follower, and worked with a big tech company to build a clinical repository for the organization.

It initially compiled data from just one hospital, but as more hospitals joined the system through mergers and acquisitions, the repository became more complex. The team that supported it needed clinical expertise to handle issues like normalization of laboratory values and standardization of test orders. He had some great stories about how the repository grew and became integrated with electronic medical records. It lasted for more than two decades before being retired in favor of a half-billion-dollar investment to move everyone to a single platform.

My colleague still refers to the systems clinicians use as EMRs. That led to a discussion of EMR versus EHR. One member admitted that he uses the terms EMR and EHR interchangeably because he keeps getting loaner computers from his IT department and hates having to go into all the different dictionaries to prevent the system from autocorrecting EHR to HER.

That admission led to a discussion about how the Microsoft Office suite and Office 365 applications handle such things, which bafflingly makes the setting device-specific rather than defaulting from the user profile. I’m no expert, but I know that it’s annoying every time I get a new laptop. I usually end up consulting Google because finding it in the application settings isn’t intuitive.

Quite a bit of back and forth ensued around the merits of EMR versus EHR. I was surprised by how passionate some of the people are about one or the other. We all agreed that “health record” is more comprehensive than “medical record.” One of the group felt that the latter sounded more serious since “health” is often linked with “wellness,” which often includes non-evidence-based and consumer-oriented services.

People pulled out their phones to look for articles for and against each term. I was surprised that the first response that popped up in my EMR versus EHR query was that “EMRs are mainly used by clinicians for diagnosis and treatment, while EHRs are designed to be shared and accessed by the patient. EMRs are less susceptible to cybersecurity issues, since they are not being shared with patients, but are securely managed by the practice.”

That got us rolling, since none of us has encountered a cybersecurity issue related to patient use, but we’ve seen plenty of times where trained employees and hospital medical staff fell victim to phishing schemes. An ASTP/ONC blog addresses the topic, but it’s from 2011. Some of its language is identical to what I found in that first response, which leads me to suspect that the vendor had done some copying and paraphrasing from ASTP.

Most of us agreed that now it’s kind of a stylistic thing and we aren’t bothered when vendor folks use the words interchangeably. I’ve worked with vendor organizations whose style guide spells out which term to use when referring to their products, but not everyone has one of those. I remember reaching out to Epic a few years ago to ask if it had an official position one way or the other and was told that it doesn’t. If that has changed, feel free to drop a comment and let me know the current state.

That conversation led us into a whole “words have meaning” discussion. That immediately drew me in because the industry is plagued by people who use words that don’t make sense. Maybe it’s a phrase they learned during a corporate training class, or perhaps they saw it in an article. When they come to me as a CMIO and start spouting words that don’t completely work together, it makes my attention go zinging off elsewhere.

One colleague, who is a doctor of osteopathic medicine, noted that nothing turns him off more than using “MD” as shorthand for “doctor.” Both have the same number of syllables, so it’s not like saying MD is faster or easier. It’s not worth it to use it in a way that alienates a subset of physicians.

One of the group brought up a recent position paper in Annals of Internal Medicine that addresses “The Ethical Significance of Names in Health Care.” It’s an analysis of the physician versus provider debate, referring to the latter term as contributing to “deprofessionalization.” The authors felt that their examination was unique because it looks at the situation from an ethics perspective.

I popped up the article while we were talking and was excited to see a Shakespeare quote in the first screenful of text. The article includes a review of the origins of care-related words, including patient, physician, doctor, and compassion.

One might have expected that the article would recommend simply not lumping physicians in with other kinds of heath care providers, but it went further to suggest that we get rid of the word “provider” entirely: “Language in health care has ethical and practical implications. Physicians should be referred to as physicians, not providers. Also, when describing professionals with varied credentials who care for patients, the terms clinicians or health care professionals, should be used.”

I’ve been a fan of the word clinician for a long time. It’s shorter than the recommended alternative. I plan to stick with it.

Not surprisingly, we stumbled into a discussion of clinical informatics versus medical informatics, and even a debate about informaticist versus informatician. There’s actually a paper from 2024 called “Informaticist or Informatician? A Literary Perspective”  that goes deep into the history of the two. My colleague quickly sent me a link.

It is a fascinating read. The authors close with a clinical informatics spin on a classic Shakespeare quote, which made me smile. They also received a chuckle with their line, “Whether you are an informaticist or an informatician, may you collaborate better than the Montagues and Capulets.”

Even though the conversation was all over the place, it’s always good to catch up with colleagues who have fought the same battles and who have made it through the same topsy-turvy changes within the industry. They are not only knowledgeable, but are generally a fun bunch. I feel privileged to have them on my phone-a-friend list when times get tough.

Is your company in EMR or EHR mode? What phrases, taglines, or buzzwords make you cringe? Leave a comment or email me.

Email Dr. Jayne.