Electronic Health Records (EHR, EMR)
Idaho State University will pay $400,000 to the U.S. Department of Health Human Services to settle alleged violations of the HIPAA Security Rule. The settlement comes after ISU's Pocatello Family Medicine Clinic disabled server firewall protections for a period of at least 10 months, resulting in the breach of electronic protected health information for some 17,500 patients.
The Beacon Communities proved that organizations can advocate changes to how healthcare is paid for by working with payers and providers, while improving quality and safety at the same time. "These were the pillars of the Beacon Community activities, and they taught us," National Coordinator for Health IT Farzad Mostashari, MD, said. "They showed what we needed to do."
More than half of all eligible providers nationwide have received federal incentive payments for demonstrating meaningful use of electronic health records, rates that have more than doubled since last year alone, HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius announced Wednesday.
Ever since the updated HIPAA rule took effect last March, some hospital IT departments see themselves as "the HIPAA police," clamping down in ways that the rule doesn't require, says one industry expert.
Healthcare organizations will need to be more effective, cost efficient and productive in the future to not only survive, but also to maintain positive cash flows, according to Brian Fugere, COO of RemitDATA.
Several organized physician groups are beta testing URAC's new clinical integration accreditation program standards. The independent standards organization created the new program to serve as a road map for health providers to achieve clinical integration and accountable care. By earning URAC accreditation, providers will demonstrate they are delivering improved patient care and reducing costs.
Members of Congress are lauding a bipartisan bill that limits funding for an integrated electronic health record system between VA and DoD and requires aggressive progress updates from both agencies, which have, in recent months, come under fire for the dilatory pace at which they're moving forward with the iEHR.
"It's systems that let ordinary people do extraordinary things," national coordinator for health IT Farzad Mostashari, MD said during a Health IT Policy Committee meeting talk that vice chair Paul Tang described immediately afterward as "inspiring and challenging."
Larry Garber is a believer. The physician and medical director for informatics at Worcester, Mass.-based Reliant Medical Group has seen electronic health records make big, real life changes both financially and clinically, and now he's set out to spread the word.
Continuing the upward trajectory of EHR reimbursements flowing out into the healthcare industry, CMS said on Tuesday morning that the total paid as of March's end is more than $13.7 billion.