Tag: EHR

Technology should promote patient involvement not replace it

Dec 4, 2008• 3

By THCB Reader SR

This post came as a comment by SR to Dr. Kibbe’s piece on electronic medical records. It’s a great consumer perspective and worth reprinting in full. — THCB Staff

Health Care consumers and patients have a wide range of interests,
needs and values that vary across our lifespans and circumstances and
hopefully there will be many different tools, products and services
provided to both providers and users of health care.

For example, my 70-year-old retired father is the head of a neighborhood
wellness program with over 3,000 people and maintained a family blog
during my mom’s cancer treatment but doesn’t own a cell phone and would
rarely change physicians despite differences in quality. I am rarely
ill, and yet expect SMS alerts if a lab test is done and want my
clinical records to link with my Nike tracker in my shoe as well as
apps on my Iphone.

I envision a system similar to the financial sector (bad example
right now perhaps) where you are able to move your information from
clinician to clinician (online bank statements = EMR) supplement that
with information gathered via other ancillary providers (investment
account at E-trade) take all of that information into my PHR (without
entering most of the data so it is similar to downloading into
Quicken) adding in some personal data (from my nike+ sensor and mobile
apps that track my diet and yoga classes) and generate reports (like
turbo tax) to share with some of my providers

Fact or Fiction: Electronic health records save money

Dec 1, 2008• 24

Note by Brian Klepper: Today the actuarial consulting firm Milliman is convening a town hall meeting in Seattle focused generally on health care reform, but specifically on Electronic Health Records (EHRs). The larger Seattle metropolitan area is a hotbed of health care innovation, with Virginia Mason Health System, Costco, Starbucks, Boeing, Premera and other forward-thinking firms. The conference will have representatives from CMS, Microsoft, the VA, Group Health Cooperative, and Milliman, and is open to the public. Should be an interesting session.

To kick it off, here’s a little piece on EHRs by Jeremy Engdahl-Johnson, Managing Editor at Milliman.

By JEREMY ENGDAHL-JOHNSON

Of all the initiatives endorsed by outgoing Secretary of Health Mike
Leavitt, few are likely to be met with as much agreement by his likely
successor, Tom Daschle, as the need for wider adoption of electronic
health records (EHR). While there is general agreement on the need for
this technology investment—both presidential campaigns included EHR in
their health platforms—the cost ramifications are still up for debate.
Will electronic health records reduce costs? There are compelling
reasons to answer both “yes” and “no.”

Electronic health records provide the foundation for clinical excellence

Nov 24, 2008• 5

By Scott Shreeve Scottshreeve

I have mentioned this many times but it bears repeating with three
recent news articles – the electronic health record itself is not a
game changer but it is a powerful information gathering tool.

However,
by gathering information in a single collaborative place, EHR
technology allows all clinical providers to measure, monitor, and begin
to improve the way they provide care. It is this later part, which is part of the overall organizational transformation enabled by the technology (not solely because of it), that allows an organization to achieve the promised high performance results of an often painful EHR implementation.

Medical informatics needs a rock star

Nov 17, 2008• 2

By Neil Versel

Medical informatics needs a rock star. Not a David Brailer-esque figure
who could excite people in the technology sphere, but perhaps a Don
Berwick type who can reach every level and constituency of health care,
and even capture the imagination of the general public.

I had this thought yesterday during a highly engaging session at the American Medical Informatics Association‘s
annual symposium in Washington, a session with the mouthful of a title,
“Harnessing Mass Collaboration to Synthesize and Disseminate Successful
CDS Implementation Practices.” In English, that means panelists were
discussing the forthcoming “Improving Outcomes with Clinical Decision Support: An Implementer’s Guide” and related feedback mechanisms, including a wiki.

Health care information technology in an early Obama Administration

Nov 7, 2008• 5

By John Halamka Halamka

When Obama takes office in January, the economy will be his first
priority, followed by the war in Iraq. Health care will follow as his
next major issue to address.

What will he do?

I imagine
he’ll take a phased approach to ensuring all Americans have access to
health care. Given the change management needed to accomplish this, it
will take a while.

However, Health care Information Technology
has broad bipartisan support and is his best strategy to reduce
health care costs, reimburse providers for quality instead of quantity,
and to ensure coordination of care. Here are my predictions for
health care IT in the first year of the Obama administration:

At Kaiser, “The EMR is the Foundation of Everything We Do”

Nov 7, 2008• 1

By Scott Shreeve

Continuing his series of interviews about the business care for Health 2.0, here Scott Shreeve interviews Anna-Lisa Silvestre, the VP of Online Services for Kaiser Permanente.

SS: Anna-Lisa, nice to meet you. Tell me a little about your background?

AL: I started out with Kaiser Permanente 23 years
ago as a health educator. I was fortunate to be able to transition into
the interactive technology unit that was created in the mid 1990’s. We
had a singular focus on developing online capabilities back in the good
old HTML days. However, things have dramatically changed since then and
we now have over 2.5M members who have activated an online account; 60%
of those users signed on two or more times last year.

Jonathan Bush: athenahealth, paper faxes, adopting ponies & much more

Nov 6, 2008• 1

At last month’s Health 2.0 Conference CEO Jonathan Bush gave a tour de force interview (with Chris Lawton from the WSJ trying his best to contain him!) about what Athenahealth does and where it fits into the world of health care and Health 2.0.

If you didn’t think that faxes received in physician offices were stand-up comedy material, you should absolutely take a look!

Confessions of a Physician EMR Champion

Nov 1, 2008• 103

By DAVID KIBBE, MD

Starting this month and continuing for the next year or so, I’ll be presenting a standard talk to physician audiences entitled “Confessions of a Physician EMR Champion,” subtitled “A Conversation with American Physicians About How to Save Medicine in the Age of Information.”

The broad message is that, to be successful, the adoption of health IT by physicians, nurses, and staff must extend communication and health data exchange beyond the narrow confines inside the four walls of their practice. Health IT needs to empower all providers to act as effective members of a team which includes the patient, medical home, specialists, and ancillary service providers such as pharmacists and lab technicians.

My “confession” is that for several years I led a team effort by the American Academy of Family Physicians, its state chapters, and its members, to promote adoption of electronic medical records, or EMR software systems. Between 2003 and 2007, the percentage of the AAFP’s active membership of 60,000 doctors who utilize an EMR from a commercial vendor in their practices jumped from about 10 percent to almost 50 percent. The overwhelming majority of the doctors in these practices consider this a good thing, and would never go back to paper systems. The accumulated knowledge and experience about EMRs among the AAFP’s membership is unparalleled.Continue reading…

Make your voice heard!

Oct 28, 2008• 3

For the next week, you have a unique opportunity to make your voice heard on health information privacy issues, their impact on the Health 2.0 movement, and how best to build public trust in these technologies.

The National Academy of Public Administration (with funding from the Office of Management & Budget) is hosting a unique "national dialogue" on the intersection of health IT and privacy, which will take place on the Web beginning yesterday, October 27, and lasting through November 3.

They are seeking to gather feedback from the public on the important privacy issues that confront all of us as we promote the movement to e-health. A report will be generated based on the responses, so it is important that a broad range of stakeholders participate. Go to www.thenationaldialogue.org to find out more and to log on!

Hat tip to: The Health 2.0 social network

Health technology need not go to backburner during economic downturn

Oct 22, 2008• 5

By Jane Sarasohn-Kahn

In the past several months, there’s been some wringing of hands and some
82pxglassofwater pronouncements of glasses-half-empty concerning health reform and technology innovation.

For us glass-half-full types, here’s something to consider…

Roughly 15,000 physicians in the state of Michigan began to electronically link up this week. The new online service has been developed by Covisint, whose roots are in the automotive industry. Covisint’s client is the Michigan State Medical Society, which looks to the new MSMS Connect network to enable the state’s 15,000 doctors to do e-prescribing, secure messaging, and practice management online. You can learn more about the project here. Covisint is a subsidiary of Compuware.

The service will be live to all on January 1st and will be free to all practicing physicians in the state of Michigan.