News 8/18/10

From The PACS Designer: “Re: Box.net. With the Google Wave application headed to Google’s archives, another collaboration tool called Box.net may offer an alternative for developers. The path to Meaningful Use is being studied by many, and the Box.net collaboration tool can work with Google Apps to satisfy the need to work together to improve healthcare processes.”

From Jim: “Re: Ed Marx. Although I read HIStalk regularly, I haven’t paid enough attention to him. The recent mention of his strategic plan got me to go back a read many of his postings. I don’t know how I’ve missed him, but what a find. He is one of the more refreshing and inspirational voices in HIT. Very belated congratulations on spotting his talent and sharing it with us. Thanks.” I’ll accept those compliments on behalf of Ed and add my own since I agree completely. I should mention, though, that you didn’t actually miss Ed’s earlier postings here — he’s been posting only for a few months. He had been writing for one of the rags and decided to make a change, part of which involved my back-loading all of his earlier posts to HIStalk. I think he’s found a wider and apparently more appreciative audience. Inga gets some credit, too, since she was his main contact (everybody likes Inga, of course).

From Defiant: “Re: Tiger Institute for Health Innovation at the University of Missouri. Next month will be its anniversary. Would you be interested in interviewing leadership there about the progress made to date and what their vision is all about?” Sure.

Thomas Jefferson University Hospitals contracts with 3M for document management and abstracting solutions.

Sacramento Maternal-Fetal Medicine (CA) chooses the SRS hybrid EMR.

We reported a reader’s rumor awhile back that suggested the Department of Defense might be thinking about mothballing its multi-billion dollar AHLTA EMR system. That may be correct, according to some sleuthing by NextGov, which found this solicitation buried in TRICARE procurement documents. It suggests that the military is considering commercial alternatives. The scope (warning: .DOCX) includes inpatient, outpatient, intensive care, ED, expeditionary, and ambulatory surgery, with “integrated support” of lab, pharmacy, radiology, and PACS. The EHR piece must cover telehealth, referral tracking, decision support, identity management, secure messaging, NHIN integration, cost accounting, personal health records, and a patient portal.

Thanks to the readers who tipped me off early about the Ingenix acquisition of Axolotl. Actually, Ingenix itself was prompt in sending over the announcement. Much appreciated. I think many people had failed to notice the company’s impressive string of acquisitions until I listed some of them yesterday.

Pittsburgh paramedics are upset with the county’s $10 million dispatching system upgrade, which they say is incorrectly prioritizing calls.

QuadraMed will offer clinical practice guidelines from CPMRC to its QCPR customers.

HIMSS, WEDI, EHNAC, and NACHA (that’s a bunch of acronyms, but they’re spelled out in the press release) release a white paper covering HITECH and HIPAA compliance for financial institutions.

Australia’s prime minister funds $225 million for telehealth sessions, plus more money for provider hardware and a videoconferencing-based triage service.

An Australian doctor accused of defrauding Medicare in 90% of her hormone testing patients says the government is wrong in saying she maintained incomplete medical records that did not include complaints, procedures, and histories. She says she’s just one of the 90% of doctors with bad handwriting, but has since computerized and “now I write a big story and I don’t abbreviate anything.”

An odd medication error: a mother who had just delivered triplets by C-section is ordered morphine. She was holding one of the babies when the nurse pushed the morphine into the baby’s IV line instead of hers. The baby’s fine, but the mom is suing anyway. The hospital has since created a policy that prohibits giving meds to moms in the NICU.

E-mail me.

HERtalk by Inga

Former Siemens Healthcare CEO Jim Reid-Anderson  is the new president and CEO of Six Flags Entertainment. I’m sorry, but that statement is just a bad joke waiting to happen (chime in, if you are so inclined.)

Moses Cone Health Systems (NC) and WakeMed Health & Hospitals (NC) are working with their state’s hospital and medical associations, as well as Thomas Reuters and CareEvolution to develop and launch the North Carolina HIE. The HIE will initially connect seven hospitals, three EDs, and 57 physician practices.

Over 40 health systems join Premier healthcare alliance’s ACO Readiness Collaborative and work together on building the critical components of accountable care organizations. Those 40 health systems represent a lot of hospitals and doctors who are betting ACOs are going to have a big impact.

If ACOs aren’t enough to give you a bit of anxiety, perhaps consider the pending v5010 deadline. Robyn O’Connell  of Hayes Management Consulting shares information and advice for migrating to v5010 here.

The Methodist Hospitals (IN) intend to fully implement Epic’s EMR within the next 30 days.

The local business journal chronicles the leadership of API Healthcare CEO J.P. Fingado, who left Cerner two years ago to head up API. Francisco Partners bought API  shortly after his arrival. Since 2008, the 28-year old company has gone from serving 600 hospitals to 700, increased sales from $40 to $50 million, and grown its employee base from 250 to 330. Sounds like Fingado is doing something right.

Here’s a recap of some good stuff from HIStalk Practice, just in case you missed it:

• An interview with AdvancedMD Inc. CEO Eric Morgan, who shares some insights on industry consolidation, on the advantages of being a private versus a public company, and on some of his company’s recent successes.
• Dr. Joel Diamond rants a bit about statistics. Try not to grin.
• If you need some inspiration, read about the work of Kenyan pediatrician Dr. Sidney Nesbitt, who Dr. Gregg Alexander calls an “amazing pioneer.”
• I rally for the co-founder of DoseSpot, who may have been an entrepreneur longer than he’s been shaving.

MidSouth eHealth Alliance (TN) signs a multi-year contract with ICA to provide its CareAlign HIE solution.

Orlando Health partners with Isabel Healthcare to implement its diagnosis decision support checklist tool.

Patient Access Solutions intends to integrate the iMedicor portal into its offerings, plus provide users access to iMedicor’s ClearLobby platform.

Persuading influential medical centers to adopt EMRs helps speed adoption by neighboring hospitals. That’s the conclusion of a study published in Management Science, which looked at what mechanisms influence the rapid spread of technology in hospitals. Apparently hospitals seem to follow a “social contagion” model. Note the parallel with fashion: celebrities first, then the rest of us. Draw your own conclusions.

Governor Schwarzenegger and a bunch of dignitaries launch the $30 million California Telehealth Network initiative, which aims to connect over 800 healthcare facilities to a statewide medical-grade network of healthcare and emergency services.

Odd: the police are called to a Burger King, tasked with removing a woman taking blood and urine samples in the bathroom. The woman claimed to be an RN working for a mobile medical exam company and collecting samples for insurance screenings. At least she wasn’t working the drive-through.

Chinese hospitals are apparently not the safest placed to work. During the month a June, a doctor was stabbed to death by the son of a patient who died, three doctors were severely burned when a patient set fire to the hospital office, and a pediatrician was injured after he jumped out a fifth floor window to escape the angry relatives of a newborn that died under his care. Such violence is apparently standard fare for Chinese physicians. Now if I were a Chinese doctor, I might be asking Steven Slater some advice on how to resign.

E-mail Inga.