Client News Coverage

Before cloud computing, there was software-as-a-service computing, which was a lot like its predecessor the application service provider model, which bore many similarities to remotely-hosted apps, which was akin to its predecessor, Web-based computing.

Health Data Management»

John Norenberg, vice president of physician services for Chicago-based Advocate Health Care, faces a common industry dilemma-from the health system perspective at least. "We need to exchange data with affiliated physicians," he says. "And we need to do it in a way that's very flexible." Advocate's physician network is broad-with nearly 5,000 doctors admitting to Advocate's 12 hospitals, which run a Cerner inpatient electronic health record.

Health Data Management»

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has posted its Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) for 2014 certification of electronic health record (EHR) technology. While the NPRM supports CMS' proposed Meaningful Use Stage 2 requirements in many different ways, its most important objective—and the linchpin of MU Stage 2 as well—is to increase the ability of EHRs to communicate with one another.

Information Week Healthcare»

Health information exchanges (HIEs) got another boost last week as two more states announced plans to form public or community HIEs and a large health insurer said it would operate its own private HIE.

Modern Medicine»

Sharon Regional Health System faced a dilemma after completing a comprehensive master patient index cleanup in preparation for its new electronic health record system. While the cleanup had eliminated existing duplicate records from the system, limited internal resources and manual processes meant that maintaining a clean MPI would be an ongoing challenge — one shared by many facilities.

Becker's Hospital Review»

The use of point-of-care decision support technology in hospitals is key to successfully accelerating the adoption of clinical best practices. Physician champions and hospital executives have realized that without a fast and reliable way of standardizing care to support use of the latest evidence, the potential for raising the bar on quality initiatives is minimized at best.

Executive Insight»

The quality agenda in gastroenterology has gained new momentum in recent years. As the specialty pursues improved quality, better patient outcomes and lower cost of care, endoscopy centers are under increased pressure to track, report and benchmark key quality and performance measures.

Executive Insight»

It's a new day for quality reporting in ambulatory surgery centers. Many have already recognized the benefits and are engaged in tracking and improving performance indicators. For the others, reality is about to arrive as federal regulations take effect that now up the ante for all ASCs.

Becker's ASC Review»

October 1, 2013 marks the day that healthcare organizations must comply with the most significant–and underestimated–mandate in recent history.  That is the date by which hospitals, health systems, physician practices, insurance companies and any other organization covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) must have completed their transition to the ICD-10 code set.

Kforce Kronicle»

Consider the following scenario. A patient in a hospital acquires pneumonia. When the attending physician enters an order for the antibiotic ceftriaxone, an alert pops up indicating that the patient is allergic to the medication. Based on the information provided, the physician chooses another appropriate medication.

Patient Safety & Quality Healthcare»

Long-term sustainability is one of the critical challenges facing health information exchange (HIE) initiatives. In its recent report, 2011 Report on Health Information Exchange: Sustainable HIE in a Changing Landscape, eHealth Initiative identified just 24 out of the 196 active HIEs around the country that categorized themselves as sustainable.

Government Health IT»

Medicare’s ACO programs, which are tied to the Affordable Care Act, could find themselves in a vulnerable position in 2012, with both a Supreme Court decision on the reform statute and potential budget cuts looming on the horizon. But some say that no matter what the legal and political outcomes are next year, ACOs will find a way to survive in the Medicare space.

AIS Health»

The use of clinical decision support (CDS) to elevate patient care is a solid strategy in any healthcare environment. And while the benefits of decision-support tools are expected to be far reaching across the patient-care continuum, there are likely no areas more primed for realizing their potential than critical care.

Health Management Technology»

Standardization of care and adoption of evidence-based medicine into clinical practice are two central tenets of meaningful use of EHRs. At Sibley Memorial Hospital, we have found the integration of evidence-based order sets with the EHR for point-of-care access as one way to accomplish these goals.

CMIO»

Responding to concerns that its original regulations stymied reform efforts, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) made a number of concessions in its final Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) rules. Nonetheless, many organizations remain hesitant about entering the ACO fray and continue weighing the pros and cons of setting up the infrastructure demanded by CMS.

Government Health IT»