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January 1, 2013 News No Comments

From Sal the Stockbroker: “Re: HIStalk. For seven of your 10 years I worked for a healthcare IT company and followed you religiously, even though you trashed our marketing a few times (we deserved it!) I still follow three years after I left IT. While dispensing news, opinion, rumors, and research, you all seemed almost like family. I will still follow, if nothing else but to see the latest Spotify playlist or WNA’s weekly clincher. Thanks to all of you, including Mrs. HIStalk for putting up with your insane work hours, loud music, and blogging obsession.” Thanks for the encouragement – it helps during those long, lonely evenings. Mrs. H probably knows my music only from the bass and drum beats since my room (office? study? den? All sound pretentious) is above the kitchen, although she works in that room only a fraction of the time I’m in mine — she’s often asleep in bed by the time I’m finished. I’ve started using headphones, though, since the sound is cleaner.

Happy 2013. It’s not even 9:00 a.m. Eastern time on New Year’s Day as I’m writing this and the web stats show that 30 people are reading HIStalk online right now. I figured everybody would be sleeping in, so it’s either early-rising go-getters or hard-partying folks who haven’t yet called it a night who are reading Ed Marx’s piece on creating a family plan.

My New Year’s Day plans including watching the Rose Parade with Mrs. HIStalk, the only televised parade I’m willing to watch with her since I have zero tolerance for dull scripted banter, endless product placements, anything related to Disney, and lip-synching, bottom-feeding pseudo-celebrities pitching lame TV shows that are, not coincidentally, airing on the same TV network that’s running the parade. (I repeatedly recite those observations while we’re watching the Thanksgiving and Christmas parades until we’re mutually relieved that I wander off to Netflix or the iPad.) The comes bowl games, which interest me for around 30 minutes until I go do something else, and then we always eat hot dogs as a New Year’s tradition since we were so poor when we were first married that we couldn’t afford anything else to eat on the folding card table and chairs that served as dining room furniture, which was fine because we didn’t have a dining room either. Then it’s back to work tomorrow and the inevitable HIMSS conference ramp-up that awaits through March once I get home each day.

Final December stats for the one reader who asks: 116,659 visits and 224,820 page views, up considerably from December 2011’s numbers.

HIStalkapalooza details and sign-ups will be up on January 19 or thereabouts.

1-1-2013 8-21-47 AM

Pain Clinic of Northwest Florida, Inc. files a lawsuit against Allscripts for pulling the MyWay rug out from under the practice, also seeking to have their complaint certified as a class action lawsuit. The wording of the complaint reads like someone dashed off an angry e-mail and their attorney just pasted it into a Word lawsuit template. It says MyWay was “buggy,” that Allscripts had little ability to bring it up to HITECH standards since they acquired rather than developed the source code, and the company made “fraudulent” statements insisting that the integration of MyWay was going great until the company “admitted defeat” in October 2012. It also claims that Allscripts told MyWay users they would be charged “thousands of dollars in fees” to get access to their own databases if they chose to walk away and that in some cases users were upgraded “without that user’s consent or knowledge” (how is that possible?)  It’s easy to understand why the practice is upset – they bought MyWay four months before it was put on life support.

1-1-2013 8-32-48 AM

Welcome to new HIStalk Platinum Sponsor EDCO Health Information Solutions of Frontenac, MO. The company has been helping healthcare organizations and HIM departments manage their patient information for over 50 years. Its Solarity software creates a complete electronic patient record, indexing and reviewing documents in a single step using proprietary document recognition algorithms instead of bar codes to index documents faster and more accurately. The result is a streamlined HIM process, improved return on investment on EHR systems via increased efficiency and physician adoption, and reduced A/R days due to faster chart turnaround time. The IT people like the integration, while the finance department likes paying as an operating rather than a capital expense. The company also offers the SaaS-based Solcom electronic document management system that allows hospitals to eliminate paper, enjoy seamless viewing of scanned records, and build custom workflows to maximize efficiency, all of which contribute to proactive revenue cycle management, point-of-service information capture, use of remote coders, and a fully electronic chart. Check out the case studies from Allegiance Health, Health First, Ottawa Hospital, and others. Thanks to EDCO Health Information Solutions for supporting my work.

I found this video on EDCO Solarity. It’s a nice 70-second overview.


1-1-2013 8-07-17 AM

It’s a new year, so it’s time for the HISsies Awards to start up. What were the smartest and stupidest vendor actions of 2012? Which companies are the best and worst? What buzzwords are you sick of? If you had a pie, in which industry figure’s face would you like to throw it? And in the more serious categories, who’s your choice for Industry Figure of the Year and the Lifetime Achievement Award? It all starts with the nominations, from which the final ballot will be created. The nominations form is open and your civic duty calls.

This is a chance for you to spare me the frequent and frustrating after-the-fact dialog in which someone claims that I’m clueless or biased because their pet choice wasn’t included on the HISsies ballot. I patiently explain that had they and their like-minded peers spent 30 seconds filling out the nomination form instead of complaining, their preference might well have been on the ballot. It’s simple Civics 101 – the most-nominated choices go on the ballot. Don’t assume someone else will do your work for you in nominating your preference. Nominate now or forever hold your peace. 

I’ll create the final ballot in a week or so. It goes only to readers who have subscribed to the e-mail updates, which prevents the admittedly fun ballot box-stuffing that happened during the first few years of the HISsies. Back then I was just happy that companies wanted a good-category win (“best vendor” or “best CEO”) enough to strong-arm their employees to vote for them.

Last year’s HISsies results are here if you need a refresher. I’ve done the Lifetime Achievement Award for two years and no repeat winners are allowed, so nominate someone other than John Glaser and Judy Faulkner.


Contacts

Mr. H, Inga, Dr. Jayne, Dr. Gregg.

More news: HIStalk Practice, HIStalk Connect.



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