The Medical Group Management Association has selected a new chief with as strong a background in health IT as practically any other leader of a healthcare organization not specifically dedicated to IT promotion. MGMA, an Englewood, CO-based organization comprised of group physician practice administrators and leaders, has named Susan L. Turney, MD, to succeed William F. Jessee, MD, as president and CEO. Jessee, himself a vocal advocate for IT adoption in healthcare, will retire after 12 years in charge. MGMA says its 22,500 members lead 13,600 healthcare organizations that provide more than 40% of the healthcare services delivered in the United States.
A patient has sued Tufts Medical Center and a primary care doctor there, alleging that documents including her medical history were sent to a fax machine at her workplace without her consent. Kimberly White of Middleborough, 44, said in an interview that at least two co-workers read the records, causing her embarrassment. She filed a complaint in Plymouth County Superior Court alleging that her privacy rights were violated and seeking punitive damages. The hospital has denied wrongdoing. While recovering from a hysterectomy in December, White asked Kimberly Schelling, MD, to fax a required form related to a disability claim to White's employer. Instead, according to the court filing, four pages of White's medical records were sent to a shared fax machine in the office. "I feel like I might have walked in [the office] naked," White said. She did not want to share the details of her medical history, which are not included in her initial filing, but the court complaint called the information in the records "extremely embarrassing."
Despite threats from fiscal conservatives to withdraw unspent money from President Obama's stimulus legislation, it is highly unlikely that Congress will cut off future funding of Medicare and Medicaid subsidies for Meaningful Use of electronic health records, according to a key health IT lobbyist. Recent speculation has suggested that deficit hawks in Congress could refuse to appropriate EHR incentive money in the 2012 federal budget. Even though the 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act authorizes a net $27 billion in spending to support EHR adoption through 2017, lawmakers must fund the program each year. But withdrawing the cash would not be simple.
Accepting Facebook friend requests from current or former patients is a lousy idea, the British Medical Association is telling physicians. The group's new social media guidance notes that "because of the power imbalance that can exist in any doctor-patient relationship," it's important to establish a professional boundary. And that can be tough to do given all the personal information a Facebook status-update stream can deliver. You can imagine a scenario, for example, where a doctor sees pictures posted on Facebook of a patient he knows to be three months pregnant at a party, with a cigarette in one hand and a beer in the other. Is it ethical to bring it up at the next visit, even if she doesn't?
When a patient comes into the emergency room with symptoms of a stroke, access to a neurologist within minutes can make a big difference between whether they live, die or end up permanently disabled. Technology that hospital chain HCA's local TriStar Health System subsidiary plans to roll out next week at five of its Nashville-area hospitals aims to ensure there's a neurologist on hand instantly -- albeit virtually -- to make the right life-saving choices. TriStar's system can be used to determine whether the patient had a severe stroke and needs clot-dissolving drugs to prevent more damage.
Seattle Children's Hospital is testing a new kind of data aggregator that focuses more on the front-end user experience rather than the underlying technology to provide a more complete, accessible snapshot of a patient's condition and status. The technology is intended to foster patient-centric communication and ultimately allow clinicians to provide better, more coordinated care. "It's an incredible, new way to provide us with new ways of looking at information," Ari Pollack, MD, an informatics leader at the hospital, said of the Seattle Children's Patient Information System, a custom-built, Web-based program that pulls data from electronic medical records and other information systems, then presents a variety of user-friendly snapshots of patients. "EMRs are becoming increasingly more complex in terms of information going in," Pollack explained to InformationWeek Healthcare.