News
Two Stage 6 hospitals, one in Manhattan and the other in Honolulu - Mount Sinai Medical Center and Hawai'i Pacific Health - are due to pick up their 2012 Enterprise HIMSS Davies Awards of Excellence at the 2013 Annual HIMSS Conference & Exhibition in New Orleans, March 3-7.
The idea of unique patient identifiers (UPIs) could very well be reality in the not-so-distant future. Despite the current standstill at the federal level, other efforts to implement UPIs are very much moving forward.
Already this year, healthcare providers have launched 106 new accountable care organizations (ACOs) that will reach as many as four million beneficiaries, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced Jan. 10.
Family physicians are adopting electronic health records (EHRs) at a much faster rate than earlier data suggested, reaching a nearly 70 percent adoption rate nationwide, new study findings reveal.
A recent study by Weill Cornell Medical College shows how electronic health records can do much better when it comes to gauging the quality of patient care.
One thing I've learned in the government is that words matter, and sometimes, particularly in complicated or technical areas, it can be hard to use words that are precise and accurate.
As National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, Farzad Mostahari, MD, has, since 2011, led the government's efforts to transform the nation's healthcare structure into a 21st century digital system. The goals are to improve patient care, increase efficiencies and lower costs. Mostashari delivered a rousing keynote talk at HIMSS12, and he is slated as a headliner again this year (Thursday, March 7, at 8:30 a.m.).
It was a task that extended beyond hammers and nails. After the blow of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the greater New Orleans area was faced with the challenge of rebuilding its internal public health structure - beyond the material repair of roofs and floors, waiting rooms and patient rooms.
2013 has already proved to be a big year for patient privacy. HHS released the long-awaited HIPAA final rule. Legislation that would regulate how mHealth app developers collect data was drafted. And the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) started the year off with stricter enforcement relating to privacy breaches.
Healthcare IT insiders regard interoperability as the key to effective health information exchange, and some might say, the hardest to pin down thus far. Industry leaders agree there can be no true exchange without interoperability. How can healthcare transformation occur unless doctor A's EHR can process the information received from doctor B's EHR?