EPtalk by Dr. Jayne 7/14/16

HIMSS has started planning for National Health IT Week, to be held September 26-30. Events include a “Virtual March” to allow participants to reach out to their representatives to discuss the benefits of health IT in advancing medicine. The “Activities & Agenda” section of the website still lists the 2015 content, so we’ll have to wait to see exactly what is on tap for this year.

A good friend shared a link to Stop Meeting Like This. which has some eye-catching headlines. My favorite was the link to the flow chart that answers the perennial question, “Are you about to have a crappy meeting?” Although it’s largely tongue in cheek, it made me smile. The fact that other people think about how soul-sucking meetings can be reminds me that I’m not alone.

Other topics include strategies for making sure 24-hour access doesn’t interfere with work-life balance and the “dark side” of collaboration. I’ve got some colleagues who could definitely benefit from the latter piece. I love the last line of the piece: “Make sure that the collaboration in your organization isn’t just a smokescreen allowing many to coast on the efforts of others.”

Another friend clued me in to Athenahealth’s take on “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie,” which appeared just a couple of days after my own mention of the classic tale. They did a really good job with it, ultimately calling on CMS to “avoid ending this sordid tale exactly where we started” and saying “it may be too late at this point to take back the cookie from CMS, but it’s not too late to push back on the milk.”

The AMIA 2016 Annual Symposium “early bird” registration deadline is approaching. It’s closer to home for me this year, but I’m not sure I’m going to make it. It’s nearly back-to-back with another conference I’m already committed to attend and even the early bird registration rate is nearly $1,000. Add in hotel, meals, and travel and it’s a good chunk of change.

I do enjoy going, though, and getting together with colleagues who work in different spaces within the clinical informatics universe. It’s good to be able to commiserate about some of the things we see in the field, but now that I have more responsibility with my practice, it’s harder to get away.

I’m also interested in attending the NCQA Patient Centered Medical Home Congress in October (and also in Chicago). Moving forward with PCMH efforts will clearly benefit physicians and practices as we move towards value-based care. However, NCQA is planning to update its recognition program, “planning an ambitious full redesign.” Public comments on the proposed redesign close Friday, so I hope people have been able to submit their thoughts.

Recently I came across a physician who wants me to come up with a strategy to “de-spam” his Direct interoperability solution. He’s in a part of the country where secure communications between providers is really taking off, but he’s not happy that pharmacy benefits managers and other organizations have started sending patient-related communications. He wants to restrict use of messaging to only physicians, which flies in the face of the idea of team-based and collaborative care. He also wants to figure out a way to make his address “unlisted” so that people can only reach him when he wants them to reach him. I’m not sure what to tell him, but I’m betting my informatics colleagues will have some ideas.

It’s not health IT-related, but it did make my day. The Apollo Guidance Computer code is making the rounds on the internet. There’s some pretty humorous bits and also a little Shakespeare included for good measure. The article is worth the read if you’re looking for a little distraction.

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