Morning Headlines 7/23/13

HHS auditors target upcoding of Medicare bills via EHRs
 
Federal regulators conduct targeted audits of hospitals following months of speculation that EHR usage may be contributing to fraudulent upcoding.

A Better Online Diagnosis Before the Doctor Visit

The Wall Street Journal covers the online symptom checker market, including a website called Isabel that was able to suggest the correct diagnosis in 48 of 50 complex cases.

Colorado HIE enlists more hospitals

Colorado’s health information exchange now connects 50 percent of the state’s hospitals, including all of those with over 100 beds.

2013 First Half Trends Report – Healthcare Industry

A report on mergers and acquisitions within the healthcare / pharma information technology industry finds that deals are down 16 percent overall for the first half of 2013. However, transaction values are up 58 percent compared to the second half of 2012, from $5 billion to $8 billion.

Morning Headlines 7/22/13

Quality Systems, Inc. 8-K filed 7/17/2013

Quality Systems, Inc., parent company of NextGen, files an SEC 8-K form that includes language suggesting that it may be looking to be acquired.

athenahealth Management Discusses Q2 2013 Results – Earnings Call Transcript

Jonathan Bush discusses athenahealth’s poor Q2 performance on an earnings call held Friday.

New Medicaid computer system doesn’t end errors

New Hampshire’s new $90 million Medicaid computer system has bogged down reimbursement processing significantly, resulting 40 percent of claims being suspended pending further analysis. Meanwhile, some providers say they aren’t getting paid properly.

Veterans in Data Breach Suit Suffered No Harm, Government Argues

In a class action lawsuit filed against Department of Veterans Affairs over a stolen laptop containing sensitive patient information, the federal government is defending itself by arguing that since there is no proof that the thieves ever accessed the data, there is ultimately no proof that an improper disclosure actually took place.

Morning Headlines 7/19/13

Athenahealth Slips To Loss In Q2; Backs FY13 Outlook

Athenahealth reports a $12.4 million net loss, or -$0.34 per share in its Q2 results. Despite the poor performance, the company stands by its year end-forecast.

Data show electronic health records empower patients and equip doctors

CMS releases a report touting standout metrics of the EHR incentive program. It says EHRs have sent 190 million prescriptions and 13 million patient reminders electronically.

Bill sets timeline for health records sharing

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) proposes a bill that would set concrete milestones and a firm timeline for the VA/DoD EHR project.

Hospital Denied Access to Its Own Records

Milwaukee Health Service is suing Atlanta-based Business Computer Applications, demanding that the company restore access to its electronic medical records. Milwaukee Health scrapped BCA’s Pearl EMR and migrated to GE Centricity, but BCA says it has not been fully paid.

Morning Headlines 7/18/13

Quality Systems to Nominate New Directors to Board

Quality Systems, Inc. parent company of NextGen, has announced that it will add three new directors to its board to avoid a proxy fight initiated by activist investor Clifton Group. The deal will send Clifton Group nominees James C. Malone, Peter M. Neupert, and Morris Panner to the board. In exchange, the Clifton Group will withdraw both its call for the current board to be replaced as well as its series of bylaw proposals that would have been up for vote at the next shareholder meeting on August 15.

EHR Industry Insiders Predict the Demise of Hundreds of Competitors in Black Book Replacement Market Survey

An EHR replacement trends report predicts a 50 percent reduction in the crowded field of EHR vendors by 2017 or the implementation Meaningful Use Stage 3. The study polled 880 EHR consultants, analysts, managers, and support team members on the state of affairs in what it calls the "Year of the Great EHR Switch."

Sen. Hatch calls for pausing meaningful use program

In a finance oversight meeting with Farzad Mostashari, MD, Senator Orrin Hatch proposed a pause to the Meaningful Use program to evaluate whether the program may have "set the bar too low." He says the program should be judged not by how much incentive money has been spent, but on demonstrable improvements in patient care.

PeaceHealth making cuts to close $130 million budget gap

Vancouver, WA-based PeaceHealth is targeting $130 million in spending cuts to account for reduced reimbursement rates and a planned $350 million EHR implementation that will take place across its health system over the next few years. Cost-saving strategies will include voluntary furloughs, early retirement, reduced travel, leaving vacant positions unfilled, and consolidating the number of contractors.

Morning Headlines 7/17/13

Effect of Electronic Health Records on Health Care Costs: Longitudinal Comparative Evidence From Community Practices

A study funded by the Massachusetts eHealth Collaborative and published in the Annals of Internal Medicine finds that EHR adoption does not lead to cost savings. However, using ambulatory EHRs in community practices did modestly slow cost growth.

Pioneer Accountable Care Organizations succeed in improving care, lowering costs

CMS has released quality and cost performance data on the Pioneer ACO program which, it says saw quality improvements across the board and cost reductions at a majority of participating organizations. Still, seven organizations have announced that they will switch to the Medicare Shared Savings ACO program and an additional two sites have confirmed that they will leave the ACO model altogether.

U.S. News names its ‘Best Hospitals’ list

Johns Hopkins Hospital reclaims the top spot on the Best Hospitals list after its 21-year streak at number one was broken last year by Massachusetts General Hospital.

Electronic Medical Records: Friend or Foe?

A union nurse working at McLaren Macomb Hospital (MI) criticizes the usability of EHRs, McKesson’s Paragon in particular. She says the value of EHR systems is clear to the union, but hospital administration has a responsibility to provide an EHR sophisticated enough to handle both the legal compliance needs and the needs of the clinicians and patients.

Morning Headlines 7/16/13

Personal health record vendor MyMedicalRecord announces that it is on the verge of securing a patent for what is essentially e-prescribing technology. The patent describes "providing a user with the ability to access and manage prescriptions online by providing features that include sending prescriptions to a pharmacy, accessing prescriptions from a pharmacy, scheduling prescription refills, sending reminders regarding prescription refills including by text or email, and identifying adverse drug interactions by analyzing prescription medications."

Morning Headlines 7/15/13

Practice Fusion raising $60M, sources say

Ambulatory EHR freeware vendor Practice Fusion is rumored to be within days of announcing $60 million in new funding from an undisclosed New York-based investment firm.

Sutter’s New Electronic System Causes Serious Disruptions to Safe Patient Care at E. Bay Hospitals

Nurses with the California Nurses Association working at Alta Bates Summit Medical Center (CA) have gone on strike, citing patient safety concerns with the hospital’s newly implemented Epic system. Alta Bates, a Sutter Health facility, becomes the third health system to fall victim to an EHR-related nursing strike in the past few months after Affinity’s nurses hit the pavement in June over what they called a "hurried" Cerner implementation and Martin General Hospital (CA) nurses went on strike in May to delay a upcoming McKesson implementation. Sutter Health is reportedly spending $1 billion on a system-wide Epic implementation.

Athenahealth soars on Ascension deal

Athenahealth stock rose 20 percent Friday after the company announced a deal with Ascension Health Network worth as much as $42 million. Athena will implement its practice management solution to more than 4,000 Ascension providers.

Do Clinical Trials Work?

An op-ed in the New York Times questions the validity of clinical trials for new medications.The use of Avastin to slow the development of aggressive brain tumors is discussed. Researchers have not been able to link Avastin to improved survival rates through clinical trials despite growing anecdotal evidence that suggests a relationship does exist.

Morning Headlines 7/12/13

Defense and VA to Congress on Health Records: It’s The Data, Not The Software

Defense Undersecretary Frank Kendall reports to a House Armed Services and Veterans’ Affairs Committee hearing that the DoD and VA will create a new shared platform that will allow the two departments to pass key clinical information from separate EHRs. The new plan replaces the original iEHR plan that promised a single, integrated EHR for approximately 200 VA and DoD hospitals nationwide. The iEHR program was originally expected to cost between $4 billion and $6 billion but the budget soon ballooned to $28 billion, which is more than CMS is projected to spend on the entire Meaningful Use program.

Allscripts jumps on better 2Q contract booking

Allscripts shares rise more than 16 percent this week when the company reports an increase in contract bookings for the second quarter. The recently announced five-year managed IT contract extension with North Shore-LIJ Health System helped boost the numbers.

Fort Worth hospital reports huge data breach

A Fort Worth, TX hospital is notifying hundreds of thousands of patients cared for during the 1980s that their personal health information may have been exposed after microfiche pages containing names, addresses, birth dates, health information, and in some cases Social Security numbers are found in a local park.

HIMSS Workforce Survey, July 2013

HIMSS publishes the results of its first annual healthcare IT workforce survey, which finds that 85 percent of surveyed organizations had done at least some hiring this year compared to just 13 percent that had experienced layoffs. The most common positions being filled are for clinical application support staff and help desk staff. Seventy-nine percent of respondents say they will add staff next year.

Morning Headlines 7/11/13

The University of Texas at Austin and Jericho Systems Launch National Pilot to Advance Patient Control Over Shared Medical Records 

An ONC-approved pilot program at the University of Texas at Austin will explore advanced patient control over shared medical records via a simulated exchange using eHealth Exchange specifications. The pilot’s goal is to add transparency to the PHI exchange process by allowing patients to review requests to view their PHI.

North Shore-LIJ Extends Allscripts Outsourcing Agreement Through 2020

Sixteen-hospital network North Shore-LIJ extends its managed IT contract with Allscripts through 2020, a deal that will result in $400 million in revenue for Allscripts over the life of the contract.

Mount Sinai honored for electronic records system

Mount Sinai Hospital was named a HIMSS Stage 6 hospital last week, just three months after its $120 million Epic go-live.

Morning Headlines 7/10/13

Stinger Medical Merges with Enovate

Stringer Medical, which manufactures mobile workstations, has merged with its primary competitor Evnovate, resulting in the largest mobile workstation producer in the country.

Health Information Technology in the United States 2013

Since 2010, EHR adoption has tripled in the US, with 42 percent of hospitals and 38 percent of eligible providers successfully attesting to Stage 1 Meaningful Use .

CMS mulls payment policy changes on chronic care, telehealth

CMS is considering paying paying primary care physicians for chronic care management services without requiring an in-person patient visit, suggesting that telehealth services may finally become reimbursable.

OFT probe could ratchet up pressure on health IT providers

In England, the Office of Fair Trading is investigating health IT vendors that intentionally limit interoperability to gain strategic advantage.

Morning Headlines 7/9/13

Study: Remote Patient Monitoring Adoption Poised For Robust Growth, Says Spyglass Consulting Group

A new study compiling the opinions of more than 100 healthcare leaders working in organizations that provide telehealth services finds that remote patient monitoring solutions are positioned for strong short-term growth, driven by ACOs beginning to formulate population health strategies and hospitals looking to proactively control 30-day readmission rates.

A shorter wait in the ER is just a click away at hospitals with startup’s virtual waiting service

Health IT startup InQuicker is making inroads working to reduce ED wait times. The company has developed an online waiting service similar in functionality to OpenTable. The software, which is accessed from the hospital’s website, allows patients with non-life-threatening conditions to check in from home and wait there during the time they would normally spend in the waiting room.

Brookings finds healthcare jobs soaring over other industries

The Brookings Institution releases a report on job growth that places healthcare ahead of all other sectors, realizing a 22.7 percent employment growth rate over 10 years compared to an average 2.1 percent from all other industries. Across the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the US, healthcare accounted for more than one in every 10 jobs.

JRMC Formally Announces Agreement with Sanford Health

Jamestown Regional Medical Center (ND) has partnered with 35-hospital network Sanford Health in order to have Sanford’s Epic EHR installed at JRMC. In addition to the EHR agreement, Stanford will help expand oncology services offered at Jamestown. The 25-bed hospital will otherwise continue to operate as an independent critical access hospital.

Morning Headlines 7/8/13

Outsourced UPMC workers protest cuts

Transcriptionists at Pittsburgh’s UPMC protest the decision to outsource their jobs to Nuance. The workers were offered remote positions with Nuance, but at a significant pay cut.

ONC Patient Safety Webinar

ONC will hold a meeting on its recently announced patient safety plan this Wednesday, July 10, at 3:45pm EDT.

Low sign-up for Australian eHealth records

In Australia, the highly publicized national patient portal is criticized after the one-year anniversary of its launch passes with only two percent of the Australian population having created accounts.

Open Letter to Chuck Hagel: DoD still doesn’t know what the hell they are doing

VistA expert Tom Munnecke publishes an open letter to Chuck Hagel in which he explains why implementing VistA would be a logical choice for the DoD and why a commercial solution would be an expensive mistake. He uses England’s NPfIT failure as an example of what can go wrong when a national strategy is centered around integrating multiple systems and points to the NHS’s recent decision to evaluate the use of VistA as a single, integrated solution as validation of that approach.

Morning Headlines 7/5/13

May 2013: EHR Incentive Program

May marks the slowest growth in eligible professional attestation since June 2011, netting just 892 new EPs and moving total attestation rates from 55.3 percent to 55.4 percent.

Safer Hospitals, Safer Wards: Achieving an Integrated Digital Care Record

In England, the NHS issues a report which confirms that it is evaluating the implementation of VistA to meet its health IT goals in an open source environment.

Lawmakers release comments on call for ‘reboot’ of Meaningful Use program

Six Republican senators have released the public comments they solicited in April regarding a request to HHS to publish a written plan for how it is implementing the HITECH Act.

Indiana FSSA notifying clients of potential information breach

A computer glitch that caused medical records to be erroneously printed and mailed to the wrong patients is being blamed for a massive personal data breach in Indiana that has impacted as many as 187,000 patients.

Morning Headlines 7/3/13

Health IT Patient Safety Action and Surveillance Plan

ONC releases its much-anticipated patient safety and surveillance plan that tackles a number of issues, such as how patient safety problems will be reported and tracked. EHR certification bodies will be required to confirm functionality and usability not only through testing, but through field observation. The Joint Commission has also been contracted to help identify and address safety issues.

Intuit Announces Next Phase of Structural Moves; Organizational Foundation Now in Place

Intuit will sell its Intuit Health Group, reporting that it had initially evaluated healthcare as a growth opportunity, but that it had come to realize that its health group would be better off with an organization that has a stronger focus on the healthcare industry.

Judge orders Affinity to bargain with union

A judge in Ohio has sided with a nurses’ union at Affinity Medical Center after they filed a unfair labor charge over a rushed Cerner implementation. Nurses claimed that the go-live date was too aggressive and a lack of training compromised patient safety. The judge ruled that Affinity leadership violated labor laws a number of times, first by refusing to negotiate with the nurses’ union, but other less-than-honorable examples cited by the judge included managers reducing the number of nurses in the ICU as retaliation and managers scrutinizing the charts of nurses who were outspoken union supporters in an effort to initiate disciplinary actions.

Washington Hospital "goes live" with $86 million electronic medical records system

In Freemont, CA, 339-bed Washington Hospital goes live on Epic across all inpatient and outpatient departments.

Morning Headlines 7/2/13

Halamka: IT Must Plan For Disparate EHRs

InformationWeek picks up a blog post by John Halamka, MD, CIO at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, in which he suggests that the "rip and replace" approach to integrating large health systems will not be possible much longer as ICD-10 and Meaningful Use Stage 2 continue to consume capital and IT resources. He advocates a form of affiliation planning in which critical workflows are targeted and automated rather than integrating all care areas.

El Camino Hospital Cuts Readmissions 25% With Health IT

The 433-bed El Camino Hospital in Mountain View, CA reduces readmissions by 25 percent by identifying patients who are likely to be readmitted and taking aggressive action to correct the problems. One solution that shows promise is a tele-transfer planning program that requires clinicians working at long-term facilities to begin participating remotely in discharge planning meetings early in their patient’s stay at the hospital.

Digital health funding is up, but growth slows, says Rock Health

San Francisco-based health IT incubator Rock Health releases a report detailing venture capital investment activity in the health IT startup sector. The report concludes that investments are up 12 percent from last year, with nearly $900 million invested in startups thus far in 2013, but that the pace of growth has slowed as compared to last year.

Facebook grapples with rules for patients seeking organ donors

Facebook is working on implementing a communication platform that will help match patients seeking organ donors with those that may be in a position to respond. This is the second major announcement from Facebook on the subject. The company recently implemented a program that allows users to declare themselves organ donors on their Facebook profiles, an action that automatically launches an official donor registration website where users can register, then posts a message about being an organ donor on the users profile. That initiative has been credited with significantly increasing organ donor registration rates since its deployment.

Morning Headlines 7/1/13

Jackson plans $830 million overhaul

Jackson Health System, a six-hospital network based in Miami, FL, is asking local taxpayers to foot the bill for an $830 million overhaul. The money would come from a proposed increase in property tax on Miami-Dade residents and would pay for building repairs, new elevators, room renovations, and $130 million in new software for the health system.

Hopkins, Walgreens partner on East Baltimore pharmacy

Walgreens is opening a new location in East Baltimore in partnership with Johns Hopkins Medicine that will be used to pilot new health products and services, including in-store clinics capable of providing urgent, non-emergency care.

Lost piece of thumb drive contained thousands of patient records

A practice in Nebraska is notifying more than 2,000 patients that their medical records may have been exposed after a physician loses an unencrypted thumb drive.

Pa. hospital sued over uninsured man’s 2011 death

In Pittsburgh, UPMC-Mercy is sued along with four doctors for failing to operate on a patient with diverticulitis over 15 months of treatment, allegedly because he did not have insurance, a fact that was noted in his medical record.

Morning Headlines 6/28/13

Update On the Adoption Of Health Information Technology and Related Efforts To Facilitate the Electronic Use and Exchange Of Health Information

ONC publishes its annual report to Congress on health IT adoption as required by the HITECH act. The report addresses EHR adoption, health information exchange adoption, and the general state of the nation as it pertains to health IT.

Created in the Corridor: Geonetric

Geonetric, a Web developer specialized in creating patient portals for hospitals and health systems, is profiled in the local Cedar Rapids, IA media for its unusual HR policies. None of its 70 employees have managers; instead, work is done collaboratively. Dress is casual, Fridays are bring your own meat for the office barbecue, and the company CEO calls its staff "probably one of the most advanced software teams in Iowa." The company’s own website is notably underwhelming considering that description, but the product must be top notch because it has plans to add 130 employees over the next year.

Sprint Launches Secure Messaging Solutions to Enable HIPAA Compliance

Sprint announces the availability of two HIPAA-compliant text messaging platforms, a functionally rich solution called TigerText and a less expensive, stripped down option that still delivers person-to-person HIPAA-compliant texting.

Cerner supports Blue Button + to engage individuals for better health

Cerner announces that it will support the Blue Button + initiative, which means that Cerner clients can now securely deliver information to any personal health record participating in Blue Button +.