On one floor high in Regional Medical Center in Anniston is a room with nothing but rows of desktop computers. From there, it's a few clicks for a physician to check a patient's medical chart and prescribe medication. Outside on a wall in the hallway is a small flat screen that shows where patients are, which rooms are occupied and which need cleaning. In years past, all these things were accomplished with countless paper forms and by phone calls. Federal health care reform is changing things, however, requiring all hospitals to go paperless as a way to improve efficiency and accuracy in the medical industry. And so far, officials from RMC and the area's other two hospitals say they are on track with meeting federal guidelines.
The 113th Congress will be the first one in 40 years to convene without California Congressman Pete Stark as a member. Stark was defeated in November by a fellow Democrat under new California voting rules. Stark may not be a household name. But he leaves a long-lasting mark on the nation's health care system. So just how influential has Pete Stark been on health policy in his four decades on Capitol Hill? Very, says John Rother, head of the National Coalition on Health Care. Stark has "been part of almost every piece of health legislation that's been enacted, including the Affordable Care Act," Rother says. "And many of the changes and improvements in Medicare trace to him as well."
Primary care providers across the country are facing similar circumstances: increased demand for services and trepidation that Congress will fail to pass a temporary fix to the sustainable growth rate, or SGR, that controls Medicare costs.
Healthcare IT, like all of IT, has changed tremendously over the past year. The Affordable Healthcare Act is now the law of the land (and will probably stay that way), which means digital record-keeping will continue to grow in importance. 2013 also marks the beginning of payment bundling, which will mean that more (and more reliable) data interchange will become increasingly necessary. ZDNet columnist, David Gewirtz, is also IT advisor to the Florida Public Health Association. The columnist asked David to look forward into the new year and identify five major trends that will truly have an impact on the healthcare providers he advises.
NYU Langone Medical Center opened its doors to surgical patients on Thursday, almost two months after Hurricane Sandy overflowed the banks of the East River and forced the evacuation of hundreds of patients. While the medical center had been treating many outpatients, it had farmed out surgery to other hospitals, which created scheduling problems that forced many patients to have their operations on nights and weekends, when staffing is traditionally low.
To provide all Americans with health insurance, premiums will have to rise to pay for it, Aetna CEO Mark Bertolini told CNBC's "Closing Bell" on Wednesday. "If we're going to insure all Americans, which is a worthy and appropriate cause, then somebody has to pay for it," Bertolini said of the expected premium increases under Obamacare. Bertolini said that insurance premiums could double in some places just on the basis of what types of policies people buy today.