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News 11/12/10

November 11, 2010 News 6 Comments

From The PACS Designer: “Re: CCHIT’s EACH program. TPD is happy to see that the CCHIT organization has realized that many hospitals have custom EHRs, and now through their new EACH program, they will be able to get current hospital EHR configurations certified more quickly than going to an all new EHR product.”



From Mrs. Marine: “Re: Veterans Day. Many thanks for your gracious acknowledgment of our servicemen and women. My husband is a 20-year Marine and I still get a chill when someone goes out of their way to thank him (or me) for his service. I would also like to acknowledge the many companies in healthcare IT that provide opportunities to military spouses like me to achieve in our own careers in spite of the many challenges that a military life presents. I can tell you from my own experience that I am a better employee, wife, and mother because I have had the support of my company in every way. To Mac, Mike, Tom, and Clair — I will be forever grateful. To the industry, thank you for taking care of us…all of us.”

11-11-2010 6-37-38 PM 

One more military note: congratulations to HIStalk pal Admiral Cindy Dullea, who retired from the Navy after 30 years of service last month. She is a board-certified informatics nurse and was Deputy Commander, Navy Medicine National Capital Area and Deputy Director, Navy Nurse Corps, Reserve Component. She continues as SVP of marketing at SCI Solutions, which has been a sponsor of HIStalk for most of the 7.5 years that I’ve been writing it.

Accelarad announces its Turbo Gateway DICOM image transmission technology, which it says will speed up image delivery to and from cloud-based repositories via the Internet by up to 300% (4.5 CT images and 9 MR images per second).

11-11-2010 8-43-18 PM

Wilson Memorial Hospital (OH) names Larry Meyers as CIO. He was previously IT manager with Children’s Medical Center of Dayton.

A study of 250 hospitals by CapSite finds that 25% plan to invest in new Vendor Neutral Archive solutions.

Jobs from the HIStalk Sponsor Job Page: Healthcare Consulting Leader, Channel Account Manager – Cerner, Product Manager – Mobile Point-of-Care Solutions, Senior Manager Segment Marketing. On Healthcare IT Jobs: Implementation Engineer – Eastern Region, Systems Analyst Programmer V, Cerner FirstNet Analyst, Interface Engineer.

PolyRemedy brings on two new executives: Jeffrey Tingle (previously with the Risk Management Foundation of Harvard Medical Institutions) as software development VP and Heath Umbach (from WebMD) as director of product management. The company offers a Personalized Woundcare System that allows clinicians to assess and document using Web-based tools.

Aetna’s incoming CEO says the company will enter the US HIT market to take advantage of healthcare reform. Earlier talk I’d heard pointed to mostly consumer-focused Web tools, but you never know who they might buy.

The Norwegian government will support the Maternal mHealth Initiative with a $1 million donation.

11-11-2010 8-48-12 PM

The Institute for Clinical Systems Improvement licenses Nuance’s RadPort radiology ordering solution to support a Minnesota initiative to ensure medically appropriate use of MRI, CT, PET, and nuclear cardiology tests. The state expects to save $28 million per year based on the success of a 4,000 physician, year-long pilot. Docs get the benefit of not having to get pre-approval for the tests as long as they complete the online information needed to generate a clinical appropriateness score using rules derived from the American College of Radiology’s Appropriateness Criteria.

Coro Health receives $2 million in funding from a former Walmart CEO to deliver music “prescriptions” to long-term care patients that can help with cognitive stimulation and socialization, claimed to improve memory, reduce medication needs, and improve mood.

11-11-2010 8-49-56 PM

One of the companies showcased to President Obama during his recent visit to India was Teleradiology Solutions, India’s largest teleradiology vendor. The company says its radiologists cover the night shifts of 100 US hospitals from Bangalore. They’ll be at RSNA.

Speaking of RSNA, if you’re going and want to provide updates for HIStalk readers, we’ll take ‘em.

I’ve been really behind after attending the mHealth Summit, trying to catch up at the hospital and at HIStalk Intergalactic Headquarters (an upstairs bedroom that I just painted because Mrs. HIStalk was tired of the crappy builder’s whitewash that we had never changed). I have new sponsors to announce, reception details to hint at coyly, and HISsies to get started shortly. I’m hoping to dig out this weekend in case I’m tardy with something you’re expecting from me. To those folks, thanks for your patience, and to everyone else, thank you for reading and thereby giving me an excuse to do something that at least passes for productive on occasion.

A Harris Interactive study finds that smart phone users don’t care whose brand name is on their apps as long as they are highly recommended and offer a good user experience.

This flies against everything I’ve been taught about medical errors: the systems and procedures at Seattle Children’s were not at fault in three serious medical errors, a state investigation concludes. Everything was in place to protect patient safety, it said, which is then puzzling as to how the errors could have occurred. It also doesn’t explain why the hospital revised its medication policies after killing an 8-month-old with a tenfold overdose of calcium chloride. The investigation now focuses on the individual caregivers, which often means they get all the punishment as rogue operators (which they sometimes are, but not usually).

A Massachusetts county sheriff faults a police dispatcher for the death of a woman who choked to death on a marshmallow. Her husband called 911, but the dispatcher didn’t give him instructions on performing the Heimlich maneuver or CPR during the 12-minute call.

11-11-2010 8-11-52 PM

An Associated Press article covers informed consent applications that allow patients to review the risks of their procedures using multimedia, even from their own homes. Mentioned specifically: Chicago-based Emmi Solutions, which sells such a system used by 100 hospitals. Also mentioned: Dialog Medical, which is used by all of the VA’s hospitals.

It’s shocking that Weird News Andy missed this story: a South Carolina man high on hallucinogens is arrested after attacking officers investigating a home burglary, resisting to the point deputies have to use pepper spray, nightsticks, and a Taser on him. He’s taken to the ED, where the doctor notices a computer mouse cable dangling from his nether regions. An X-ray confirms that the rest of the mouse was where you might expect. He doesn’t remember how it got there, which is quite a testament to the power of hallucinogens.

E-mail me.

HERtalk by Inga

From Saxifraga: “Re: Facebook fan. Do I win a prize for being the 1,000th person to like you on Facebook?” I’d send you some fabulous virtual gift if I had one of those goofy Facebook apps set up. Thank you, Saxifraga, and our other 999 fans for your support. Mr. H and I are feeling very connected these days and we’re always happy to friend you on Facebook and connect with you on LinkedIn. You can also join the HIStalk Fan Club on LinkedIn, be a fan of the HIStalk page on Facebook, or follow us on Twitter. Basically, we are trying to be very hip when it comes to social media. It’s satisfying in a pathetic sort of way.

saint alphonsus

A reader tells us that Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center (ID) went live on Cerner October 15th and has reached almost 90% CPOE adoption, also deploying SurgiNet and FirstNet across all its patient and ambulatory areas.

Henry Ford Health System (MI)  announces plans for a $5 million expansion of its Rochester Hills data center, which will create 20 to 30 jobs a year for the next several years. Its technical employees are focused on the rollout of CarePlus Next Generation, the newest version of the health system’s homegrown EMR.

Healthcare providers rely on vendors with which they have an established relationship when selecting a Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC), according to KLAS. The most-considered vendor is Healthport (23% of the time), followed by MediRegs (16%) and 3M (14%.) Of the 98 provider organizations participating, 92% said they already selected a RAC solution; more than half only considered one RAC offering.

VHA selects TeleTracking’s RadarFind and its RTLS network as an option for its 1,400 member hospitals.

yuma

Yuma Regional Medical Center (AZ) will use InterSystems Ensemble for the development of interfaces with its Epic EHR application.

The VA contracts with DSS, Inc. for its Mental Health Suite EHR, which it will implement in all 153 of its hospitals.

Accenture wins a 10-year, “indefinite delivery / indefinite quantity" contract with the CDC for information management and IT infrastructure services. The total contract has a ceiling of $4 billion over the life of the contract.

The president of GE Healthcare’s business unit predicts that his division will see 10% profit annual growth, mostly due to an increase in world demand on big medical equipment. John Dineen expects particularly strong growth from China, which could grow 20% a year through 2015.

elhanan

Halfpenny Technologies names Gai Elhanan, MD, MA as the company’s CMIO. He was most recently chief of healthcare informatics at 3M Health Information Systems.

The American Medical Informatics Association declares that “hold harmless" clauses in contracts between HIT vendors and providers are unethical and that vendors should not be automatically absolved for errors or defects in their software. Instead, vendors and customers should share the responsibility for patient safety and error management. AMIA also states that safe and successful HIT systems require ethics education on the part of vendors and clients. Great recommendations, but I don’t see vendors rushing to ask attorneys rewrite their standard contracts.

CCHIT announces that it will offer a new EHR certification program for hospitals beginning December 15th. The EHR Alternative Certification of Hospitals (EACH) program is an ONC ATCB certification program that is designed for hospitals that have uncertified legacy software, customized commercial products, or self-developed EHRs.

montefiore

MonteFiore Medical Center (NY) activates DaVincian Technologies’ GUARDIAN to streamline patient registration and scheduling and improve data accuracy.


Sponsor Updates

  • The Methodist Hospital System (TX) engages MEDSEEK to create an integrated patient portal based on data from its Eclipsys inpatient system, NextGen outpatient program, and Medicity HIE.
  • Informatics Corporation of America (ICA) promotes John Tempesco from VP of client services to chief marketing officer and hires Brian Higdon, formerly of Affinion Group, as vice president of client services. Former TeraMedica Healthcare Technology VP Sandra H. Lillie also joins ICA as VP of sales and business development. In addition, ICA adds three Vanderbilt University Medical Center officials to its board of directors.
  • Bridgehead Software partners with Perceptive Software to offer a combined solution that includes Perceptive’s ImageNow enterprise content management application and Bridgehead’s virtualization storage solution.
  • Picis hosts an audio conference November 16th featuring several HIE leaders discussing the financial, operational, and clinical considerations of establishing health information exchanges.
  • MED3OOO is recognized by Everything Channel’s CRN Magazine as a Top Healthcare VAR.
  • Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare (MN) chooses Carefx and Indigo Identityware for single sign-on, context management, and clinical workflow.

inga

E-mail Inga.



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Currently there are "6 comments" on this Article:

  1. I wonder whether AMIA will help to enforce its “no hold harmless clause” position, by refusing sponsorship of any vendor who either (1) uses such clauses in its contracts or (2) refuses to say whether it uses them.

  2. Why IBM is out of healthcare:
    Just “follow the money”. IBM has a heavy overhead requiring minimal consulting rates of $230/hr (as of 6 months ago). Senior staff rates are closer to $300/hr. These might be perfect for Payers and the Feds but not for providers especially in this economy. IBM also wants each project to be at least $1M – not found often in provider consulting. And with Encore and others eating into their market, it was inevitable.

  3. Ditto comments from Mrs. Marine. Hundreds of military spouses have also found a career as medical transcriptionists and coders. They can be trained online, live anywhere and stay working for the same employer as they move from location to location. It’s a great healthcare career for military spouses and just another way our industry gives to those that serve. The DOD even provides funding through the MyCAA program. Win-win for all of us.

  4. To the commenter who mentioned IBM. Yes IBM’s costs are out of control and they lag in innovation to a large degree, but they are out of healthcare not because they want to be out, more because there are better solutions than IBM can offer.

  5. Re: Red urine

    but they are out of healthcare not because they want to be out, more because there are better solutions than IBM can offer

    The question I have is – why are there better solutions than IBM can offer? Could they not find/retain the talent to create those better solutions?







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