America Online founder Steve Case predicts that converging trends in public policy, technology and consumerism in healthcare will combine to simultaneously create disruption and opportunity, and ultimately lead to a revolution in American healthcare. Case, who now serves as chairman and CEO of Revolution Health, says that as a result, consumers need to overcome security paranoia much like they did in online financial transactions. He argues that once a secure, ubiquitous system is in place, patients and payors alike will be drawn to the financial efficiencies and clinical benefits of connected care.
National Health IT Week 2008 is scheduled for the week of June 9-13, 2008. Organizations with diverse perspectives on health and care will gather in Washington, DC, to work together with the goal of improving healthcare efficiency, quality, cost-effectiveness and patient safety through health IT. The event also coincides with several partner events, including HIMSS Advocacy Day.
Centralized health information systems have long served key functions like billing and admissions well, but have fell short on departmental clinical functions. Radiology needs to continue leading the effort for distributed but integrated systems, said Ronald L. Arenson, MD, during the opening session presentation at the 2008 Society of Imaging Informatics in Medicine Annual Meeting.
Although small, a survey of provider organizations, insurers and transactions processing vendors shows the industry is unprepared for the May 23 compliance date for the National Provider Identifier. The NPI rule requires that all providers and provider organizations that are HIPAA covered entities obtain a standard identifier to be used for billing and claims processing. Healthcare IT Transition Group, a consulting firm, put the survey together quickly after hearing many stories that complying with the NPI was “fraught with systemic flaws.”
In the next 10 to 20 years, the technology that allows us to use wireless headsets to chat on our cell phones could provide doctors with vital signs, according to a United Kingdom report. The report found that humans could one day have "in-body networks," a series of sensors implanted in a patient's body to let doctors monitor the body remotely. The report also predicted the creation of "on-body monitors," wearable devices that would send vital information via Bluetooth or Wi-Fi to a portable monitor such as a watch or a cell phone. The technologies are being researched in United Kingdom universities.
Cincinnati doctors are experimenting with texting to help tweens and teens remember to take medicines that control chronic illnesses like asthma, diabetes or kidney disease. Pilot testing recently began, with a full study set for later in 2008. Participants say what time they want the reminder, and a clinic volunteer types out the reminder messages.
Hospital leaders at Cleveland-based University Hospitals Case Medical Center have asked 40 current and former patients to serve on an advisory council to share their thoughts on shaping a future cancer hospital. UH announced plans for the hospital in 2006 as part of a $1 billion expansion.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's administration is asking state senators to restore millions of dollars in spending for healthcare and education programs. The administration warns that hospitals, nursing homes and home-care services for the disabled could be affected by budget cuts ordered by the House.
The Lousiana Legislature is nearing final passage on a package of bills designed to protect medical personnel from lawsuits that stem from healthcare delivered during emergencies. Two of the measures are inspired and backed by a New Orleans physician who was arrested but never indicted and still faces civil lawsuits related to patient deaths at Memorial Medical Center after Hurricane Katrina. The bills would provide lawsuit protections for paid medical professionals not covered under the Samaritan Act, which offers immunity from civil lawsuits for providers who voluntarily offer their care to an emergency victim in need.
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist has signed into law rules streamlining future state approval for hospitals around the state. Because of concerns that certificate of need laws are anti-competitive, Florida deregulated much of CON in the past decade, eliminating the need to go through the process to add beds or start open-heart-surgery units. But Florida's review process for new hospitals continued and took up to 10 years or more, because it allowed rival hospitals to mount seemingly endless legal roadblocks. Under the new rules, hospitals will have to state their opposition to a new facility at the start of the review process, and a hospital that challenges a regulatory decision in court and loses would have to pay the applicant hospital's legal fees, up to $1 million.
