Government & Policy

Rockland County, N.Y. legislator Alden Wolfe speaks with Government Health IT about the effort to save a public health system via HHS grant money, bipartisan efforts at the local level and what the prospect of an administration change might mean to his constituency.

Atul Gawande, MD, a surgeon, public health researcher and a writer for The New Yorker, advocates a mindset switch from docs as cowboys to docs as pit crews. Gawande also urges the smart use of data and a well-designed checklist for better and safer care.

Physicians have long operated as autonomous problem solvers, but healthcare complexity and costs will drive change to act like systems. Atul Gawande outlines 3 key skills that only exist in limited pockets but are central to the transformation.

The GOP primary candidates head to Nevada on Saturday, a state with poor healthcare and few healthcare resources -- also one that has plunged in and begun implementing what it can of the Affordable Care Act, even though many in the state don't agree with the politics of it.

In the state with our nation's shortest life-expectancy, all the Republican candidates face something of a quandary: How to entice voters with talk of cutting healthcare reform and services in a land ranking low in care quality measures.

With Minnesota's GOP caucus set for Feb. 7, we spoke to the North Star State's health IT honcho about public-private partnerships, electronic health records, health information exchange, telehealth and more. Often billed as the healthiest state in the U.S., Minnesota has long been a healthcare IT leader.

Healthcare technology stocks don't have the obvious roadblocks facing many other healthcare sectors in 2012, according to industry analysts who spoke to an audience of 600 at the Nashville Health Care Council on Feb. 1.

Often considered the healthiest state, Minnesota began harnessing HIT to bridge private and public health years before the HITECH Act. It's building on that EHR foundation for health information exchange, and is also currently cultivating a new crop of HIT professionals: informaticians.

Critics say Washington is moving too slowly on regulations and guidance for health insurance exchanges, leaving states in a time crunch wherein they must act on imperfect information.

With even more seniors than Florida, the Pine Tree State's Medicaid woes threaten health insurance coverage for as many as 65,000 citizens, not all of them retirees, either.