Morning Headlines 4/25/16

Lockheed Martin cuts 200 jobs in merger with Leidos

Lockheed Martin lays off 200 from its IT workforce in preparation for its $5 billion IT services merger with Leidos.

Testing electronic health records in the “production” environment: an essential step in the journey to a safe and effective health care system

A JAMIA article calls for testing EHR updates in both the test and production environment used by clinicians.

Vail Valley hospital says former therapist took patient records

Vail Valley Medical Center (CO) will inform 3,118 patients that their records were compromised after a former physical therapist copied their records prior to moving to a new job.

Morning Headlines 4/22/16

An Act To Prevent Opiate Abuse by Strengthening the Controlled Substances Prescription Monitoring Program

Maine will require all narcotics prescriptions to be transmitted electronically after June 1, 2018. Providers will also be required to check the state’s drug monitoring database prior to writing new prescriptions.

Rejecting employees’ pleas, EmblemHealth CEO sets major IT layoff

New York insurer EmblemHealth will lay off 250 IT and operations employees after contracting with Cognizant to modernize the company’s IT systems.

Hospital’s dispute with software provider puts patients at risk

A local TV station reports that patients at Parrish Medical Center (FL) are at risk after McKesson blocked the hospital from updating the drug formulary in its Horizon system. The hospital is in the process of suing McKesson over the implementation, which it says included unfinished software, missed deadlines, and monetary disputes.

Centra Selects Cerner’s Enterprise-Wide IT System

Five-hospital health system Centra (VA) contracts with Cerner to replace EHRs in use at each of its hospitals and 50 ambulatory and long-term care facilities.

Morning Headlines 4/20/16

Theranos Is Subject of Criminal Probe by US

Federal prosecutors have launched a criminal investigation to determine whether Theranos misled investors about the state of its technology and operations.

Major Health Insurer Bailing On Most Obamacare Exchanges

UnitedHealth Group pulls its plans from ACA exchanges, citing $1 billion in losses from the markets over the past two years.

Health apps: Unlimited promise or ‘like having a really bad doctor’

The LA Times highlights the persistently poor clinical quality of consumer-focused medical apps, citing concerns over diabetes management apps that do not instruct users to call 911 when their sugar levels are dangerously low, or apps for people with depression that do not recommend calling a suicide hotline when users report feeling unsafe or suicidal.

Movie stars have their uses: medical science isn’t one of them

The Guardian discusses the role movie stars have in forming public health opinions after Robert De Niro lobbied to have a discredited movie about the risks associated with vaccinations included in the Tribeca Film Festival.

Morning Headlines 4/19/16

Theranos Chief Elizabeth Holmes Is ‘Devastated’ Over Lab Deficiencies

Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes responds to federal calls for her ban from the blood testing industry, saying she is “devastated that we did not catch and fix these issues faster.”

CMS drops two-midnight rule’s inpatient payment cuts

CMS will stop imposing inpatient payment cuts to hospitals under the two-midnight rule.

Celebrating the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act’s First Birthday

Acting CMS administrator Andy Slavitt discusses the impact MACRA is expected to have on healthcare reform on the one-year anniversary of its passage.

Why Medical Devices Aren’t Safer

The New York Times argues for more robust tracking of implantable medical devices.

Morning Headlines 4/18/16

Epic Systems wins $940 mln U.S. jury verdict in Tata trade secret case

Epic wins its trade secret lawsuit against Indian IT firm Tata Consultancies. A judge awarded Epic $240 million in compensatory damages and $700 million in punitive damages after concluding that Tata employees illegally accessed Epic’s customer website and accessed proprietary information.

VA teases plans for new ‘state-of-the-art’ digital health platform

VA CIO LaVerne Council says she will unveil plans for a “new digital health platform” to replace VistA.

Nova Scotia spends $39M on electronic medical records push

After spending $39 million in incentive payments to encourage EHR adoption, Nova Scotia continues to rely on faxes to communicate between facilities.

Kansas City TIF Commission approves financing agreement for huge Cerner redevelopment

Kansas City approves a reimbursement plan to repay Cerner $1.75 billion of the $4.45 billion it is spending to build its new campus.

Morning Headlines 4/15/16

Missing clinical and behavioral health data in a large electronic health record (EHR) system

A JAMIA study comparing clinical data from an EHR with data from insurance claims finds that EHR data is incomplete, missing information on care delivered outside of the organization.

athenahealth Announces Acquisition of Arsenal Health, formerly known as Smart Scheduling, Inc

Athenahealth acquires former More Disruption Please startup Arsenal Health, a company building schedule optimization solutions.

Economic Outlook: Spring 2016 C-Suite Survey

A small survey of health executives finds that only 38 percent of organizations are successfully accessing ambulatory data from non-employed physicians, while 84 percent of respondents report that health IT will continue to be the area where most significant capital investments are made.

Morning Headlines 4/12/16

CMS launches largest-ever multi-payer initiative to improve primary care in America

CMS launches the Comprehensive Primary Care Plus model, a value-based payment program that will give PCPs more financial flexibility when caring for the chronically ill.

Tracking The Impact Of The Affordable Care Act In Kentucky

The Foundation for a Health Kentucky publishes a report studying Kentucky’s implementation of the ACA and its impact on coverage, access, costs, quality of care, and health outcomes.

Security flaws found in 3 state health insurance websites

The AP reports that federal investigators have identified significant cybersecurity weaknesses in the state insurance exchanges in California, Kentucky, and Vermont.

This Intel Healthcare Guru Is About to Head a Major Government Project

The NIH announces that Eric Dishman, general manager of Intel’s Health and Life Sciences Division, will head up Obama’s recently launched Precision Medicine Initiative.

Morning Headlines 4/11/16

Dell: The going rate for a hacker to break into a Gmail account is $130

Dell Security Works publishes its annual Underground Hackers Markets report, which lists the typical cost of various black hat services, including hacking email and social media accounts, running DDoS attacks, and stealing bank account information.

Lessons From More Than A Decade In Patient Portals

In a Health Affairs article, Kaiser Permanente researchers outline lessons learned in the ten years since implementing its patient portal.

Pfizer Taps IBM for Research Collaboration to Transform Parkinson’s Disease Care

Pfizer partners with IBM to co-develop remote patient monitoring solutions for patients with Parkinson’s disease.

Sentient Technologies is using AI to tackle deadly diseases

Artificial Intelligence company Sentient Technologies sets its sights on healthcare with AI nurse, a system that forecasts changes in a patient’s condition, predicting sepsis and other critical conditions.

Morning Headlines 4/8/16

MHS Genesis rolls out as name for new electronic health record

The DoD brands its Cerner implementation project MHS Genesis.

Hospitals’ Computerized Systems Proven to Prevent Medication Errors, but More is Needed to Protect Patients from Harm or Death

A new report finds that CPOE systems fail to flag 39 percent of potentially harmful drug orders and 13 percent of potentially fatal drug orders.

MedStar disputes report it ignored warnings that led to attack

MedStar disputes recent allegations that the ransomware attack it suffered exploited known security flaws from 2007 and could have been prevented with a simple software update.

As hospitals go digital, human stories get left behind

A physician at Massachusetts General Hospital (MA) argues that EHRs fail to capture a meaningful patient story, arguing that EHRs mask “how one symptom relates to another, the emotional context in which the symptoms or events occurred, or the thought process of the physician trying to pull together individual strands of data into a coherent narrative.”

Morning Headlines 4/7/16

Allergan, Pfizer call off proposed $160B merger

Pfizer backs out of its plan to acquire Allegran and move its headquarters to Ireland for tax reasons after the Treasury Department put new rules in places to make tax inversions less lucrative.

National Health IT Coordinator Says Technology Can Help Unblock Patient Data Access

National Coordinator Karen DeSalvo, MD discusses health data portability, information blocking, and cloud technology in a Wall Street Journal interview.

Better Health Care: A Way Forward

Former National Coordinator David Blumenthal writes a JAMA op-ed on improving access, cost, and quality of care.

It’s Time To Stop Pretending Patients Don’t Care About Their Medical Records

Fast Company discusses barriers to expanding patient access to their medical information after an informal internet survey finds that 77 percent of patients are very interested in having access to the information.

Morning Headlines 4/5/16

New York’s Epic EHR ‘go-lives’ please officials, staff

Two NYC Health & Hospitals facilities are live with Epic after an April 1 go-live that a spokesman for the health system went well, explaining, “There were minor issues, but they were dealt with right away.”

Theranos Devices Often Failed Accuracy Requirements

A newly released CMS inspection report confirms that Theranos’ proprietary blood testing analyzer, Edison, failed internal quality control tests 29 percent of the time, while its California lab was also cited for doing tests with unqualified personnel and storing samples at the wrong temperatures.

Proteus Digital Health Presents Interim Results at ACC From a Randomized Controlled Clinical Study of Proteus Discover

Proteus Digital Health announces interim results from an RCT study of its smartpill technology, finding that its smartpill technology improves blood pressure control in hypertension patients significantly. 85 percent of patients using the smartpill achieved their target blood pressure within four weeks, while only 33 percent of participants in a control group receiving traditional care were able to do the same.

AMA taking bigger role in key IT initiatives

Michael Hodgkins, MD, CMIO of the American Medical Association, discusses interoperability and his role on the board of the Sequoia Project, formerly Healtheway.

Morning Headlines 4/4/16

Ransomware and Recent Variants

The US Department of Homeland Security issues a ransomware alert focused on the recent increase in healthcare-focused attacks. Alvarado Hospital Medical Center (CA) and Knings Daughters Health (IN) are both hit with new ransomware attacks.

Fitch Affirms Baptist Health Care’s Rev Bonds at ‘A-‘; Outlook Stable

Fitch affirms the A- bond rating of Baptist Health Care Corporation (FL) but notes that EHR-related training costs will impact profits.

e-MDs Finalizes Acquisition of Software Technology Assets from McKesson

e-MDs completes its acquisition of McKesson ambulatory products Practice Choice, Medisoft, Medisoft Clinical, Lytec, Lytec MD, and Practice Partner.

Trades executed – or killed – by final medical opinion

A Cincinnati paper discusses the medical review process involved in baseball contracts, highlighting the MLB-wide EHR that went live in 2010 and houses medical information on every player from every team in one centralized, online database.

Morning Headlines 3/31/16

MedStar Health Update Regarding Computer Downtime

MedStar restores access to its major clinical systems 48 hours after a malware attack crippled the systems network.

It’s game over for the robot intended to replace anesthesiologists

Johnson & Johnson announces that it is pulling the plug on its anesthesiology robot Sedasys because of poor sales.

Analysis of clinical decision support system malfunctions: a case series and survey

A study published in JAMIA analyzing clinical decision support malfunctions at Brigham and Women’s Hospital concludes that malfunctions occur frequently and often go undetected. 93 percent of surveyed CMIO’s reported having experienced a CDS malfunction.

Details of Anthem’s massive cyberattack remain in the dark a year later

A year after a cyberattack that left the medical information of 78 million people exposed, the FBI is still investigating the attack and little new information has come to the surface.

Morning Headlines 3/29/16

Dell will unload IT services unit to Japan’s NTT Data

Dell will sell its IT services unit to NTT Data for $3.05 billion, money it will use to finance its $67 billion acquisition of EMC.

Google’s bold bid to transform medicine hits turbulence under a divisive CEO

Verily, Google’s life science business, has lost a dozen senior members of its team in the last year.  Former employees say that CEO Andrew Conrad is divisive and impulsive and has created a challenging work environment for staff.

Theranos Results Could Throw Off Medical Decisions, Study Finds

A study by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai finds that Theranos cholesterol results were lower than Quest and LabCorp results by an average of 9.3 percent, enough to influence medical decisions.

House tentatively OK mandatory prescription drug monitoring

In Arizona, legislators are working on a bill that will establish a prescription monitoring program within the state’s HIE.

Protecting Employees’ Health Data

The New York Times calls for limits on employer access to employee health information, citing concerns that it could make workers vulnerable to discrimination.

Morning Headlines 3/28/16

Statement from Joseph Maldonado, MD, President, Medical Society of the State of New York

The president of the Medical Society of the State of New York asks for two exceptions to the new requirement that all prescriptions be written electronically. The first would exempt providers that write less than 25 prescriptions per year, and the second would reduce documentation requirements when technical problems temporarily force providers back to paper.

Dell Services Builds Momentum with Multiple $100M+ Deals

Dell Services signs $100 million deals with Dubai Health Authority and BCBS of Rhode Island.

Hackers Steal Data On 1.5 Million Verizon Enterprise Customers

Verizon loses 1.5 million customer records to hackers who are attempting to sell the information online for $100,000.

Morning Headlines 3/25/16

Raju to explain financial plan to Council, defend records system

NYC Health + Hospitals President and CEO Ram Raju claims the April 1 Epic go-live was a self-imposed deadline that he would be comfortable moving if needed, clarifying that he would not be fired for making that decision.

The Evolving EPCS Landscape 2016: A Prescription for Stopping Opioid Abuse

DrFirst publishes a paper on e-prescribing of controlled substances in the US, noting that while 82 percent of retail pharmacies are EPCS enabled, only 5.8 percent of providers are setup for EPCS.

Providers must release all of patient data to patients, families

The Ohio Supreme Court rules that any patient data kept by a health care provider must be released to patients and family members on request. Officials at Aultman Hospital argued that only patient data held within the medical records department was required to be turned over.

Thomas Health System Selects Parallon as its Meditech 6.1 Partner

Thomas Health System (WV) selects Meditech 6.1, upgrading its legacy Meditech Magic system and replacing its Cerner/Siemens Soarian system.

Morning Headlines 3/24/16

Allscripts is buying stake in Netsmart Technologies

Allscripts and private-equity firm GI Partners will pay a combined $950 million to acquire behavioral health software vendor Netsmart Technologies as part of a new joint venture. Allscripts will pay $70 million in cash and merge its home health software business into the new venture, resulting in a company with an annual revenue of $250 million.

Opportunities and Challenges in Advancing Health Information Technology

During testimony before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, National Coordinator Karen DeSalvo, MD discussed ONC’s interoperability roadmap and the agency’s efforts to help expand the use of alternative payment models.

New HIPAA audits will target healthcare industry’s business partners

The HHS Office for Civil Rights announces that the next round of privacy and security audits will target business associates and insurers.

In Its First Year, Has Apple’s ResearchKit Revolutionized Medical Research?

Fast Company recaps ResearchKit’s first year in operation, highlighting some of the successes and barriers to growth researchers are seeing with the framework.