The Health Care Blog – Page 1045 – Everything you always wanted to know about the Health Care system. But were afraid to ask.

Above the Fold

POLICY: Michelle Malkin is really dumb

Oct 12, 2007

Yes, that headline is a blatant attempt to get some of the opprobrium Malkin and her nutty commenters are venting on Jon Cohn and Erza Klein.

A little background. Jon, being the sensible moderate, wrote a good article on why the SCHIP veto helps Universal Health Care, and then pointed out that the smearing of the kid from Baltimore whom the Dems put up to support S-CHIP was a dumb idea with lots on the far right failing to do basic fact checking. In fact the family in question was exactly the type that S-CHIP needs to help

In the NY Times today Paul Krugman puts this all into a little more narrow perspective. Suggesting that sliming Graeme Frost–the 12 year old kid in question, is just standard operating procedure for the Rush Limbaugh-types on the right, who have a pretty direct line into the Republican machine.

INTERNATIONAL: SWF seeking Canadian M

Oct 12, 2007• 1

A SWF, that’s a sick white female, is looking for a husband with Canadian health coverage.

Hospitals: Firing doctors by Paul Levy

Oct 10, 2007• 7

As one of the first CEOs in healthcare to author his own blog, Paul Levy of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center has established a cult following with outspoken posts tackling the issues he faces as the top manager at one of the most influential hospitals in the country, writing on everything from insider debates over the publication of hospital mortality and infection rates to negotiations with labor organizers and the wise use of information technology. Today he tackles a delicate subject sure to provoke debate – and enthusiasm – on the THCB discussion boards …

Several years ago, before taking this job, I was asked to turn around a
relatively small clinical trials data processing company. I had to lay
off a number of people who were not critical to the company’s success,
and one of these included a doctor who had been hired to expand the
business into a certain area that we determined was no longer
appropriate. This was not a case of incompetence or lack of energy or
enthusiasm. He was great guy with terrific credentials, but we just
could not afford his particular expertise in that troubled little
company.Recently, we had a chance to meet, and he confessed to
me that my decision to lay him off had caused him to have a real crisis
of confidence. He had never been fired before and, as he put it, his
view of himself as a person and the job he did was one and inseparable.
Here, I had torn them apart, and it took him a while to remember and feel
that he was still as adept and valuable a physician as he had been
before he was fired. Indeed, he was able to thank me, years later, for
teaching him the important lesson that a particular job does not define
who he is.I replied to him that I thought that his initial
reaction explained to me why doctor-managers often find it difficult to
fire other doctors. They too quickly internalize how it would feel to
themselves to be fired, and they project this onto others. They
conclude that they cannot devalue the professional abilities of a
fellow physician by terminating his or her employment. They have
difficulty separating the business imperative from the degradation of
one’s self esteem.

TECH: Big deal in the RF location tracking world

Oct 10, 2007

I haven’t spent much time recently on the location tracking tools that I think will be a big part of hospital efficiency improvement in the future. The folks I met this weekend at LA County are thinking about them for next year when they move to a huge new emergency room, but the big fuss at HIMSS in 2006 around the asset and people location tracking has yet to really pan out.

But maybe the market is starting to take off. Yesterday one of the companies I’ve been following for a while, Ekahau, announced a big sale to big public hospital system Carolinas HealthCare System. Given that the inherent chaos that most hospitals appear to live with (to the uneducated eye—yes, I’m picking on LA County, but you know there’s some truth in that!), the potential for efficiency improvements from asset tracking and improved communications are very real.

CONSUMERS/TECH: Molly and Don write a Gray Paper

Oct 10, 2007• 2

So this morning and yesterday afternoon at the Ix Conference I’ve heard some really interesting technology presentations from Silverlink (disclosure Ix and THCB sponsors!) & Eliza, who are both in the voice automated outbound call space. Popped in on Resolution Health, which looks like it’s emerging as a big time competitor to Active Health Management, and saw an interesting lite-weight messaging system for docs to communicate with patients (and vice versa) called CareNav. Then quick look at how Healthways working with Pro-Change Behavioral Systems is really tailoring (that’s the big Ix word this year!) HRAs—although not all Americans have taken one or even know about HRAs!

CONSUMERS/TECH: David Sobel stars on Tuesday morning at the Ix Conference

Oct 9, 2007

Yesterday (Monday) there was a great session about advertising in health care—but actually impossible to blog about as it was mostly funny videos! Great stuff from Hollywood writer Marty Montgomery who works with Vic Stretcher, HealthMedia Inc, & also from Michelle Sobel, Emmi. Go look at their sites, but briefly, people are prepared to learn about stuff that they are interested in and entertained by!

Ix this morning started with Earl Steinberg from Resolution Health and Jim Prochaska from Pro-Change Behavioral Systems. Lots of data but shorter version is, targeting and tailoring data to those targeted patients works pretty well.

Next, an award for Susan Edgman-Levitan pioneer in patient information and advocacy who actually founded Picker Institute—the originally patient survey organization. Apparently finding out what patients actually thought and wanted was a new idea before Susan showed up!

HEALTH2.0/TECH: Athena Health: The History of the First Health 2.0 IPO By Scott Shreeve

Oct 9, 2007• 3

Scott Shreeve writes frequently about Health 2.0, open source and healthcare, topics that as the co-founder of Medsphere, one of the most-closely followed companies in the industry, he is extremely well qualified to write about. If you enjoy this piece, you will probably also enjoy his recent essay "Health 2.0 Business Model: "Payment Dependent on Results." For more on AthenaHealth have a listen to our podcast interview with always-entertaining CEO Jonathan Bush, one of the real stars of this industry.

Initial Public Offering (ĭ-nĭsh’əl pŭb’lĭk ô’fər-ĭng) n.

1. The first sale of stock by a private company to the public.

2. Stock issued typically to raise capital and gain access to public markets.

3. Sale of stock typically handled by underwriters who determine type, quantity, and price of stock sold.

I have previously written on several occasions about one of my all-time favorite companies – Athena Health.
It is appropriate to once again put finger to key to congratulate
Jonathon Bush, Todd Park, Nancy Brown, Ed Park, Jon Hallock, and the
rest of the Athenista’s for their recent IPO (September 20, 2007). It was the largest IPO of 2007 and bodes well for the ongoing wave of investment in healthcare information technology.

I
find the history, growth, and now the prosperity of Athena to be
fascinating. Athena was founded by my fellow IT co-conspirators,
Jonathon Bush and Todd Park, Athena has steadily advanced over the last
decade birthing the "software as a service"
(SaaS) model within healthcare industry. I say "birthing" because I
have watched the labor pains of Athena fairly closely over the last 5
years since first meeting Todd Park in Waterbury, CT on my first ever
presentation with Medsphere. We discussed then, and watched again and again, as Athena began to take a bigger and bigger swipe at the "healthcare hairball".

TECH/CONSUMERS: Ix Therapy time again!!

Oct 8, 2007

Today Indu and I are at the Ix Therapy Conference in Park City, UT. I’m here as a guest of Josh Seidman, Dorothy Jeffress and the crew at the Center for Information Therapy

David Kibbe is up first. His talk is called "Google. Then Gargle." He’s talking about 4 disruptions:

1. EMR, and spread of electronic health records

2. MinuteClinic, and retail medicine from NPs
3. Medical Tourism, drugs and surgery abroad
4. Health2.0

He’s very interested in Microsoft’s HealthVault (although like me he notes that creating a "strong password" for HealthVault is pretty annoying–I also think HealthVault needs a tutorial PDQ too). But nonetheless the option of moving data around easily between multiple entities and providers is pretty disruptive.

JOB POST: Software architect

Oct 8, 2007

Phreesia is a
fast growing venture backed start up company looking for an experienced Software Architect.Phreesia is free to physicians in participating practices. The
Phreesia solution includes the leading edge PhreesiaPad™ which adds immediate value to the
physician’s practice by gathering comprehensive intake information and chief
complaints, decreasing the time spent asking basic questions, improving patient
flow and reducing administrative time. Based on the patient’s responses they
are automatically taken to a customized portal with relevant health and
lifestyle information. Phreesia is sponsored by pharmaceutical and healthcare
companies with relevant educational communications to patients at
the point of care.

TECH: Glen Tullman, Allscripts CEO on HealthVault

Oct 5, 2007• 2

Microsoft’s HealthVault brings lots of partners to the table. And so far it’s announced one major EMR vendor as a partner. That partner is Allscripts and this morning I got to talk with CEO Glen Tullman. Glen explained his take on Microsoft’s business model, why Allscripts is interested in getting involved and also gives a brief update on NEPSI–Allscripts’ online eRx initiative. Here’s the interview.