A new report finds that the development of regional health information organizations may not be effective in advancing healthcare information technology. The report, titled "Improving Health Care: Why a Dose of IT May Be Just What the Doctor Ordered," calls for a renewed national strategy for advancing healthcare IT.
The new Electronic Medication Management System works like a personal computer, only for prescription medications. The system stores, organizes, and dispenses up to 10 different drugs, keeps track of complex dosing schedules, maintains printable records of a patient's medical history, and sets off alarms whenever it's time to take a pill.
The Bush administration has issued an eleventh-hour challenge to the physician lobby's efforts to prevent a pending 10 percent cut in their Medicare fees, in the form of call for a mandate that doctors use new information technology standards. The administration wants to tie any legislation blocking the cut, scheduled to take effect on Jan. 1, to physicians' adoptions of health IT in their offices.
While there are numerous new products that help patients take charge of their health and medical history by organizing their records, but there are privacy concerns.
Two men have been arrested for allegedly stealing a car that had numerous documents in it, including the social security numbers and birth dates of about 200 dental patients.
Cancer patients in the United States, Canada and other countries have had medical tests postponed because of a problem with a Canadian nuclear reactor that produces medical isotopes used to diagnose and treat such cases. More than 20 million patients in Canada and the United States undergo nuclear medicine procedures every year.